


Too Much Honesty

by 4persephone



Category: Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: Gen, Hera Syndulla: The Mommening, Kallus is a closeted culture geek, Kanan Jarrus: The Daddening, On Ezra Bridger's Sexual Education, Space family, beware venegeful female twi'lek and mandalorians, cw: attempted and successful previous child molestation, cw: descriptions of harm done to a minor child, limited POV (Kanan's)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-20
Updated: 2017-12-20
Packaged: 2018-12-16 13:47:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 38,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11830002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/4persephone/pseuds/4persephone
Summary: Kanan’d kill right now for a set of ‘normal’ teenage issues to deal with.  But no: instead he got medical Fake IDs and Recruiting Space Pirates and a Padawan with a personal background so kriffing traumatic that Ezra’s really not even looking at the possibility of relationships.(Which is probably, Kanan admits, in the broader context a *good thing.*)





	1. Honesty is Less Embarressing Than Bugscreen (Updated)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DarthBreezy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarthBreezy/gifts).



> This Fic started with this ... 
> 
> I need to (not!)write a fic some day that involves the Spectre crew going out to meet a contact in a bar. And everyone but Ezra in the party gets pissed/freaked out because some random asshole also at the cantina is looking at Ezra a little too much and possibly following him around with apparent intentions that any decent parent or older sibling would find inappropriate.
> 
> And Ezra just gets ANNOYED at the situation, is like ‘Can we just ignore creepy dude and finish what we came here for PLEASE.’ Only to have Sabine insinuate he does not seem to grasp what said asshole is after. Clearly.
> 
> And Ezra just raises an eyebrow and drains his drink. Looks them all right in the eye and says something to the effect “Sabine, I kneed my first attempted rapist at seven and a half. My last? A couple months before you guys found me three years ago. The best thing about keeping my hair cut short like it is now? There’s nothing anyone can use to try and grab or move me places I definitely don't want to be." -He sets his cup down on table "Now can we all quit kriffing around and get back to doing what we actually came here for? Cause last I checked the rebellion waits on no one...”
> 
> And then he stands to go find a fresher, shaking his head as he goes. ‘Karabast..it’s not like HE even managed to actually touch me. Such a bunch of kriffing DRAMA queens.” 
> 
> After that, Ezra very obviously avoids being boxed into a room with any of them. He takes on a lot of volunteer work, sleeps in the Pheonix Squadron's dorms, and is very emphatically as he tells Kanan, 'not angry'
> 
> Meanwhile during this same time period, the Ghost absent Ezra, somehow ends with a lot of shattered and imploded kitchen crockery.
> 
> (I will eventually probably get around to the official Bar-Scene story, when I can manage the idea of Ezra that pissed off without getting really depressed....)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This Fic is for D.B. Who has put up with more of my post hospitalization ranting and raving than any sane fandom buddy should have too. But without her this story would never have existed... It is being lightly updated in December 2017 as it is recorded into podfic for some vision impaired friends who requested it and said podfic has caused a few tweaks and editions. The next new part (Chapter 8 and an expanded chapterer 7) should be up by Christmas assuming that no new urgent crises arise! (Life in my house since October = 2 emergency hospitalizations of two fathers, major surgery for a kindly mom in law, one major case of anemia/shingles for your truly...and a broken computer router and dying car... 2017 is making me ready to kick it to the curb honestly! I need too start a kriffing count down)

How any times can one heart break?  
It was never supposed to be this way  
Look in the mirror but you find someone  
You never thought you'd be.  
Oh but I can still recognize  
The one I love in your tear stained eyes.  
I know you might not see it now...  
But lift your eyes to me...

(-'When You See Wounded I See Mended')

 

PART ONE : HONESTY IS LESS EMBARRASSING THAN BUGSCREEN:

xxxxxxx

“You do realize that you’re literally hiding in a tree, yes?” Kanan leans on the broad trunk easily, not bothering to lift his head to locate his Padawan in the branches above.

“…Yes?”

“And that isn’t offending…I don’t know, your sense of personal dignity or anything?”

There’s a long pause, then tired laugh. “It could be worse, Master. I’m not the one wearing mud that’s pretending to be bugspray at the moment…”

Ezra’s not wrong about that. The mosquito population on Yavin 4 this time of the evening is sheerly ridiculous. Hera keeps promising that she'll eventually find something better to keep the pests off of all of them the next time that she’s out of the system but right now the options are a spray on bug repellent that’s near caustic to Kanan's scarred facial skin or the more naturally occurring if odiferous alternative that some of the other base residents found and started using intermittantly instead. “I still want to know why in kriff you never seem to get bit.” Kanan informs his student more than a little bit grumpily.

There’s another pause…this one something closer to considering. “The chompers and I are sort of…buds at this point, I guess?” It’s less an actual answer from Ezra than it is a plausible question.

The kid is bonding with the bloodsuckers now. Naturally. Of course he is. 

“Ezra…” Kan pauses, carefully considering his next words a long, if not uncomfortable moment. “Please, get down out of the tree. Come back to the Ghost and eat dinner with the rest of us tonight: Sabine and Hera are making your favorite. We’re...look we're not going to try and force you into talking about what you said the other night at the bar . Just, let the others spend some time in your actual presence. Please. You’re missed and everyone is reasonably worried. I know you’re mad as hell right now Kid, at everyone, but still….”

“I’m not mad.” Ezra’s sudden burst of words cut him off. He hears the rustle of leaves shifting – much closer this time then before– in the space most immediately above him. Then with a soft thudding sound, a body drops down onto the ground just a few inches out of easy arms reach. Kanan reminds himself to be careful - to not try and reach out and touch just automatically. Even if the rest of the Specters aren’t the only ones right in need of a little reassurance that the boy in front of him is whole, despite his admissions, despite everything.

Kanan raises an eyebrow, “You wanna try that one again, Ezra?” he finally says bluntly.

Ezra clears his throat. “I’m not…. about what I said in the bar other night, Kanan. I’m not angry with you guys. Not at all.”

“That.” He tells his Padawan very calmly. “Is a complete load of Bantha shit.”

Ezra half groans, half growls in reply. “Fine. Then I’m not mad about it *anymore,* Kanan. Karabast.” Kanan hears his Padawan’s hand raise to scratch at the back of his neck uneasily. “Honestly I’m just... Look, I’m sorry okay... I karked up the other night…lost my temper and like I said I’m sorry...”

The teen’s arm drops back down at his side now. Kanan can hear his shirt and pants fabric rustling as they brush together briefly. “Ezra…” He can’t keep his hand from rising to briefly grip a shoulder any longer. He simply can’t fight back the instinct. Luckily the kid doesn’t flinch at the touch – he presses into the hold a little even, though Kanan can't help but notice that Ezra also seems to hunch inward just a little bit on himself as he searches for the precisely right words to speak

“Karabast.” Ezra settles for murmuring again after another long clearly frustrated moment.

Kanan takes one more chance and tugs him forward slightly, earning a low surprised huff of air as Ezra’s head collides with his own collarbone. The hug is tight but brief. Careful as he can possibly manage to make it to be comforting but not even remotely restraining. “Kid…" His voice is calm, matter of fact, bluntly honest. "The last…the very last thing you owe any of us at this point? Is a kriffing apology.”

“I was a jerk.” Ezra’s tone, contrarily enough, is just short of defiant when he replies. Though more toward himself Kanan realizes, then toward his master. Force …is Ezra actually guilting himself for calling the rest of them out on the carpet too harshly? Because it certainly feels to Kanan like that's what he's doing.

His raises one arm high enough to smack the back of the close shorn head - gently, affectionately. “You got pissed off Ezra. You had every right and reason under the circumstances to be We were all making some pretty ignorant or naive assumptions. If you dumped us on our asses because of that…well at least the lesson, as much as it stung, still came honestly.” Kanan doesn’t neglect to understand how significant the brutal hammer blow of truth they’d been handed was within the larger scheme of things.

Ezra shifts his body just enough to rest his forehead on the center top of Kanan’s sternum for a moment or so. He breathes in and out deeply several times as if maybe fighting back tears for a moment or two, before he ultimately draws a final controlled breath in through his nose and slowly pulls back, feet shifting further apart as he straightens himself up deliberately.

“It’s been years since…well. Since. I don’t really…. I’m usually not so…” He groans. “I’m honestly pretty okay most of the time and past everything that happened, Kanan...”

This time Kanan is wise enough to only repeat the ‘Banthashit’ in his own head. This is definitely not the time unlocking for that particular discussion. He’s old and wise enough these days to know when to pick his damn battle grounds, especially concerning the topic at present.

“As I said, Hera’s making a double batch of your favorite. I’m under orders to fetch you back. Now do you need to pick anything up from your room over in Pheonix Squadron’s section before we leave?”

“Meh.” Ezra half vocalizes “No. Not really. Just need to pull on my boots and we can go, Kanan.”

Kanan’s eyebrow rises again. “Barefoot Ezra? What? Planet turning you native suddenly on me?” 

Ezra’s lowest tonal chuckle answers back. “No…more I was just reacting to simple curiosity.”

“About?”

“A few Toygruta from one of the other squadrons have been lauding the merits of going barefoot while on base in the chow hall lately. They claim the planet’s got a homey vibe about t. I guess that I just wanted to see whether it was true or not for myself.”

That’s an …interesting statement. “So? Finding anything worth mentioning?” 

Ezra considers the question a moment, “Maybe..but we can talk about it more, later. I’m starved right now and you’ve got enough mud to wash off right now as it is.” A single finger raises to coast across the curve of his Master’s cheek consideringly. “You know there really are easier ways to moisturize, Kanan. I’m sure that Sabine could have found you something less smelly if you'd just asked for assistance.”

“Hah hah. Very funny. Now move it smart ass. The bugs are swarming and you're not the only one who's hungry.”.

“Yes, Master.” Ezra answers and turns back toward where the Ghost is parked, falling into pace directly beside Kanan.

The teen makes no comment or move against the hand that stays on his back nearly the whole way back in.

xxxxxxxxxxxx

They get back to the ship’s docking area just as the very last of the twilight’s dim warmth is fading away. The climb from the docking area in living space passing unacknowledged and easy – their steps quickened by his grumbling stomachs and the fragrant rising smell of cooking meat and vegetables wafting out down the hall from out of the ship’s now crowded galley.

“Del’ani?” Ezra’s voice is shocked – delighted, as the smell registers, his forward motion on the metal floor halting for the merest fraction of a second even though he’s been told already his favorite is on the menu tonight. The faint tinge of homesickness that Kanan can hear in his voice makes something tighten in the center of the Older Jedi's chest.

Then again how long has it been since they’ve been anywhere near his home planet for any length of time? Much less found an open-air market anywhere else that had the spices for this particular cuisine? Ezra’s not inclined to be picky about food – even in his selection of what most would call favorites. If he does have his own variant of comfort food after all his years growing up on the street though, this is it. A curry like mix of rice, vegetable produce and whatever meat can be found and added in. The dishes main draw is no doubt its smell- a mixture of spicy sweet and pungent. The food in question somehow simultaneously clears your nose and activates your salivary glands from second that the fumes from the cooking kick in.

“Hera, how did you…?”

It must have taken her hours if not actual weeks to find all the spices they'd needed to replicate this. The surprise in Ezra's voice isn't actually all that surprising.

“I put up a note on the message board in the central market telling people what to keep and eye out for.” Hera’s own voice is slightly off key as Kanan hears her turn from where she's standing in front of the cooking surface. The Twi'lek doesn’t sound sad or falsely cheerful or even mad… just not quite right, and it takes him a moment to identify the mix of emotion in her voice. Hera's clearly calm right now but also a little bit stunned…she apparently hadn’t believed he’d be so fast – or apparently effortless -in reelingback in Ezra for supper. And now Hera's taking in their youngest member’s wrinkled clothes and still bare feet (Ezra had opted to carry his boots instead of slipped them back on) and she’s suddenly trapped in an internal debate with herself about whether it’s a good idea to try and hug him.

She wants to of course. Has wanted to ever since the shock wore off in that dimly lit bar and they'd headed off the planet on a direct course back to Yavin, but touching Ezra is a fraught issue at the moment. The kid has always had an iffy at best relationship with most kinds of physical affection. Tussling – wrestling, the occasional shoulder squeeze or hug is generally fine unless he’s already deliberately keeping his distance. But those were the standard rules when dealing with him two weeks ago. Back be=efore the rest of them had been forced to contend with a…well... frankly haunting visuals that Ezra had unintentionally supplied to all of them via his sudden verbal unleashing.

The effects of said rant are pretty much unavoidable now. None of them are going to be casually grabbing for Ezra or even so much as playfully ruffling his hair the way that Zeb and Sabine used to on semi-regular basis. Kriff Kana admits to himself, it’ll probably be awhile before they’re careful about just not even accidentally bumping into him. Old behavior patterns have been altered in the last couple of days since Ezra's absolutely toneless confession, and in the gaps, there’s a distinct sort of pained awkwardness setting in.

Kanan’s not the only one aware of it at the moment either, judging by the sudden, too heavy silence. “It smells great, Hera…thank you.” Ezra hastens to fill the gap at the same time that another pair of footsteps approach them.

Zeb’s voice is a little gruff. Uneasily gentle. “Hey, Kid.” He leans forward into their space, and Kanan hears him sniff a little. “You know, you’ve both got leaves stuck in your hair. There’s a few minutes to wash up b’fore dinner if you want t’clean up and make yourselves look a little bit more decent before we sit down an’ start eating.

Ezra’s retort is automatic. “Zeb, when in the whole time I've known you have I ever been anything remotely near decent?” He pokes Kanan’s arm gently, then shifting slightly to face him. “Kanan on the other hand definitely needs a fresher at present. Cause right now the *both* of you stink.”

And just like that, he somehow diffuses the tension, making Zeb gruff in protest and Hera fully relax, at least enough to make all the previous awkwardness bearable at least for the moment.

It strikes Kanan Jarrus standing there, a little tired and a little ironic, that somewhere along the way over the past few years, Ezra Bridger has become very, very good at reading and reasponding to moments of emotional unrest in all of the rest of them. It’s a useful skill no doubt, for any Jedi in particular but right now that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily a particularly healthy thing. The opposite is preferable really. Still. “Come on, Chucklehead. Fresher. Now” He gently pokes at the kid.

He can feel Sabine’s eyes on them from her spot at the table even as they turn to go. Neither she nor Ezra openly acknowledge the other’s presence directly other then with a slight nod, though Kanan also notes that there’s thankfully no other obvious bad vibes or overwhelming awkward pinging between the two of them either. They’re just…orbiting eachother cautiously for now. Allowing eachother respectful space in the wake of her unintended nuclear fall out of a comment.

Thank Force for small miracles, Kanan tiredly thinks.

XxxxxxxX

After they finish washing up, Ezra eats better than normal – which is to say about three-quarters of what’s on his plate instead of half, before ultimately pushing it back, clearing his throat and asking just a little too casually. “So…what’s on the itinerary for the next couple of weeks mission wise?”

They’ve been voluntarily self-grounded now for over a fortnight – Ever since getting back from Davin 7. There’s been the day to day requirements of fleet life of course, but nothing else to fill the extra hours. None of them are actually acknowledging it outright but they’ve basically all been on stand -bye medical leave, trying to process what happened well waiting on a new real assignment. 

Ezra doesn’t like the idleness. Really, really doesn’t like the idleness. He'd basically self-adopted himself out to Rex – who Kanan knows he’s going to need to speak with about all of this in at least some measure sooner rather then later– as a personal aid and willing combat student after about the first four or five days without any other real assignments.

The rest of them have been doing their best to…well… cope what’s just occurred basically. It’s been the equivalent of a badly needed mental health week in essence. Granted that’s taken different forms in terms of processing for each and every one of them. Kanan has spent literal hours on his knees over the past several days in only somewhat successful meditation. Hera meanwhile, with a willing Sabine in tow has cleaned the Ghost from stem to stern till it literally reeks of industriall cleaner. Her paperwork is now completely caught up and the ship is both fully repaired and completely re-provisioned. Zeb and Kallus have helped with some of that as well and when not doing that or helping other friends in C& they have spent a lot of their mornings since they got back in the courtyard with their bow rifles sparring.

None of them are mentioning the evening – well more the night – about four or five days ago now when Kanan’d woken in the middle of the night and found the rest of the crew in the middle of the cargo bay methodically destroying the Ghost’s oldest set of cooking and serving crockery. Though he’s also fairly sure that after that outburst was when things had finally begun really settling.

He’ll say this much - Hera’s grasp on multiple language invectives in the face of sheer and utterly helpless fury hasn’t slipped as much as a millimeter over the intervening years. Though yes he’s also pretty sure that it’s sheer level of scope has managed to surprise even Sabine. Kanan's lover still isn’t ready to talk openly about whatever it is that is rattling arond in her head since Ezra’s little outburst. To be fair Kanan hasn't felt all that inclined to talk about the contents of his head either. Still at least now Hera's actually sleeping in her off time not just endlessly frenetically cleaning, and her arms have resumed wrapping tightly around his torso most nights when she slips into his room and joins him in his bed. Its small progress but even that has to count for something.

Still he wonders, even if a little idly, if tonight they’ll both sleep better or worse than they have since first arriving back on Yavin 4, since it's starting to look at the moment like Ezra will probably be sleeping in his room on board tonight instead of back Pheonix Squadrons dormitory along with Zeb and Kallus where he'sbeen retreating to silently every night since they allgot back.

Sometimes, he admits, it’s a challenge balancing teenager's desire for privacy and a parent’s provoked protective instincts.

“We’ve been asked to do a milk run if we have both the will and the time…” Hera offers up after a couple of moments of prolonged uneasy silence. “There’s some medical supplies and updated repair equipment currently available if we’re willing to go and pick it up and smuggleit off of Alderaan. We’re smaller and easier to disguise in the system and more replaceable here in the meantime than one of the other freighters or the bigger Corvettes. So, I figured we’d take it.” She clears her throat. “The Organa’s have invited us out to their estate for dinner while we’re in the system too. Something about the Senator and Princess Leia welcoming a chance at reacquaintance. Plus….” There's another long pause, and her foot starts tapping on the floor underneath the table, her mug of caf clinking softly as she sets it down. 

“We’re all very much overdue right now in terms of all our mandatory fleet physical readiness examinations. They’ve been after me about the paperwork for it in central command for quite awhile now, and I figure that we can all just jointly bite the bullet and all get it done at one of the clinics in the Capitol on Alderaan while we're in system already.”

Ezra’s shield’s flare alarmingly at that as the teenager stiffens to likely board straight beside him. “I…I need to go. I need the fresher.” He says very, very abruptly, before rising and basically fleeing the room.

Hera drops her head into her hands sighing softly.

Zeb shifts in his seat, watching Ezra disappear around the corner. “Well Karabast. We managed at best thirty minutes.”

Sabine chuckles low in her throat, no humor at all in the sound. “Well, that went just about as badly as I warned you it probably would, Hera. Well done. Oh well. Points for attempted subtlety in delivery of the ultimatuum at least.”

Kanan sets his mug on the table. Reaches up a hand to rub at the muscle of his right temple wearily. “Since when,” He asks the silence calmly, far more calmly then he feels at the moment, “have any of us EVER followed standard fleet medical regulations?”

Hera sets down her mug, “Since that bar on Davin 7.” She tells him bluntly.

"Though I wasn't kidding by the way about it being mandated for all pilots. Or at least those not using a privately own vehicle of their own when actively flying."


	2. Digging In (Updated)

It’s indicative of the kind of day they’re having that literally five minutes after Ezra excuses himself from the table to go use the restroom, Kanan can feel him lose the battle not to throw up. 

He sighs at the sensation, pushing back and out of his own chair.

The looming sense of nausea from Ezra has been present ever since Hera mentioned they’ll all be seeing the doctors while on Alderaan, but his Padawan’s been fighting a brave battle to maintain his poise – his center – even employing some light meditation. It just isn’t enough on its own right now to stand against the quagmire in the younger Jedi’s head. 

“Look we might be a while. Don’t bother to come looking” He then orientates himself directly toward Hera, “Just so you know for later on Hera…I got Ezra in here tonight with the promise he wouldn’t be ambushed or otherwise forced talk about what happened before he’s ready to do so. I know that what just happened is my fault because I just assumed you’d be on the same page without checkingin first, but you should still know that he’s probably feeling pretty betrayed by what just happened at the moment.” 

Hera swears softly in Ryl, then makes a low distressed sort of sound in her throat. “Karabast! Do you think…Should I be the one to go and talk to him instead…? I mean I don't want him assuming that he can't trust me.”

“No. Not until I’ve cleared the air, anyway, Hera. He may be coding you as the bad guy right now, Hera, but that’s just because of a straight miscommunication. Though,” Kanan reaches up to rub an eyebrow, debating - not wanting to introduce more conflict to this situation than absolutely necessary, still...

“Hera could you maybe, oh I don't know...*warn* me in advance before dropping that kind of bombshell about the doctors on Ezra? I know that he may *seem* mostly unaffected by everything that’s happened in the past two weeks but the truth of the matter is…”

Zeb snorts before he can finish his sentence. “...that's the Kid’s as skittish as an unbroken mount at the moment?”

Kanan nods his head. “Pretty much yeah, exactly Zeb. He’s been keeping himself together mostly out of sheer willpower, but that doesn’t mean he’s not embarrassed and on edge, and reluctant to expose himself any further. Given the trust that he offered all of us - even unintentionally - when he revealed so much about his past the other day, we need to be really, really careful during the next few weeks not to disrespect his sense of personal autonomy…” Just like you would, Kanan thinks sadly, for any sexual assault survivor.

Hera’s voice is a little aggrieved. “Look Kanan, I take your point theoretically. But if I had given Ezra a choice about seeing someone on Alderaan, what the kriff do you think he would have said? You know Ezra understates everything, especially he's talking about his own health or past past. Skittish or not we can't just ignore our responsibility to get him any treatment he might need right now.”

Kanan sighs again, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’m not saying otherwise, all right? I agree with you Hera that he needs to see a doctor. I’m just saying that next time? You should really consider asking instead of ordering him to go Hera- even if it's more work initially to bring him around to your side. Strong arm him in painful ways too many times when Ezra’s already feeling vulnerable, and belive me, Hera, you are not going to like what happens to the two of you’s dynamic.” 

There’s more to be said on the subject than that certainly. Kriff he can practically feel Hera gearing up to do just that, but this isn’t the time for it. He draws in a deep breath, and holds up a pausing hand. “Look, we can talk about this later, Hera, all right? But right now I need to go and check on him. Kriff, Hera the kid’s throwing up right now. Again.”

That seems to do it - Hera makes another unhappy sound, then shifts on her feet nodding. “Go. Take care of it. We’ll finish this discussion up later.” Kanan nods, heading in the direction of the nearest fresher, only pausing when he arrives to stop and listen for hints of what’s happening within.

There’s no more sound of active sickness anymore, thank the Force, just an unsteady pattern of ragged breathing. Sith, the kid sounds like he’s just on the verge of a panic attack. Kanan raps on the door softly with his knuckles. “Ezra, may I come in?”

There’s a moment’s weighted pause, and then a Force flare clicks open the door lock. Ezra is sitting on the fresher floor between the bathroom cupboard and the toilet. Judging by the muffled sound of his unsteady breathing, he’s most likely curled into a partial ball at the moment with his knees to his chest and his head resting atop them.

“How can I help, Kid? What is it you need from me right now?” 

Ezra’s voice is hoarse. “Nothing Kanan, I’m fine, really. Was probably something I’d just eaten.”

‘He’s fine.’ That word clearly doesn’t mean what Ezra wants it too. Kanan drops down across from him onto the floor, folding his legs into a semi-comfortable pose, keeping his voice calm and pleasant and nonaccusing. “I know you’ve been trying to center yourself the past couple of hours. May I ask which of the calming meditations you’ve been trying?”

The teenager clears his throat again. “Just the basic ones you taught me, with candle focus when I can manage. Right now though it’s not really helping.”

He nods his head. “Do you want me to try and teach you something else or do you want to try and meditate jointly for awhile?” KAnan knows full well that sometimes the peace that evades someone in isolation can be achieved in greater community.

Ezra though just makes a sound of negation to both offers. “No. I’ll be fine in a little while, Kanan, I promise. Right now, I just want to be still and breathe for a little bit longer.” Kanan nods at that, then closes his own eyes and just offers both silence and company, projecting as much calm and safety as he can.

It takes a while, but eventually, Ezra slowly uncurls and relaxes, stretching his arms up and above his head and uncurling the toes on his still bare feet. “Kriff.” He mutters, stretching his legs out, and letting his head thump back against the cupboard door gently as he exhales, “This may sound contradictory, Kanan but I am so karking tired right now I may never be able to sleep again.”

“Nightmares?” Kanan queries softly, stretching out his own legs as well. He wouldn’t be at all surprised to find out that's the case under the circumstances. Traumatic memories tend to cycle when they’re being dragged upward even in the stablest of situations. Kanan’s honestly surprised the kid’s remained as composed as he is for as long as he has given the state of his Padawan's psyche. It says far more about Ezra's ability to function through pain than it does about anything else, to speak frankly.

Ezra shrugs in reply and Kanan rises, after another moment's consideration, to pull them both up to their feet and fill them both a glass full of water from the tap. His Padawan swishes and spits several times then shifts to lean most of his weight back against the sink before verbally answering the question.

“I've had few. Mostly it’s just been insomnia the past few nights. I keep busy all day but….” He reaches down to rub against one of his legs uneasilt, “I still end up staring at the ceiling all night most of the time. I don’t know, maybe I just need more exercise. Or a decent bottle of black market rotgut before bedtime or something.”

Kanan reaches out to carefully to poke Ezra in the shoulder in a mostly teasing rebuke. “I wouldn’t recommend it, Kid. Yeah it might knock you out for one night or even for a couple– but then it’s suddenly a habit, and ending up dependant on booze for sleep is a bad, bad position to be in, believe me.”

Ezra waves a hand and takes another sip of his water, tossing the cup in the nearest trash can after he drains it before continuing. “Probably wouldn’t be worth the effort of doing so anyway. It takes a lot to get me drunk enough to pass out. Something about the way that I metabolize alcohol, probably.”

“…I don’t want to know how you know that, do I?”

“Probably not,” Ezra confirms almost cheerfully. Then he shrugs and his lips quirk up wryly before he speak, “Kriff just as a rule I find it better to keep my trap shut about my personal history. When I do, the people around me end up far less sad, pissed off or unnecessarily twitchy.”

Kanan huffs a little at that particular confession, “…Ezra, none of the above are inappropriate responses in some circumstances. You do get that right?”

“Anger rarely helps anyone in my own experience Kanan and…well…I don’t need or do pity.” Ezra’s wipes a splash of water away from around the rim of the sink. “It completely karks up my whole personal aesthetic, for one thing.”

Force, Kanan thinks with a small frown, when had this kid become so…so darkly witty for lack of a better way to describe it? And why hadn't Kanan noticed it before now? He thinks that it's a fairly new coping mechanism that Ezra’s adopted as he’s moved deeper into puberty, but it's *not* one Kanan’s overly fond of truthfully. Not when it's just yet another way of creating more emotional distance.

He draws in a deep breath then he lets it out again, carefully considering then discarding several options for a reply. Eventually, he settles on, “Ezra, be careful that you’re not mistaking people’s concern for their pity, okay? Because they may look similar on the surface, but they’re actually parsecs apart, Kid.”

“Sure they are,” Ezra mumbles, muttering something else under his breath that the older Jedi can't quite make out initially. It takes Kanan a long moment to realize he doesn’t understand what the younger man just said because Ezra’d switched over to his native Lotholian unthinkingly.

“Hold up there a moment, Ezra. You mind repeating that last again in Basic this time?”

Ezra waves the request away. “Never mind, it's nothing important, just an old saying.”

Kanan is unimpressed by the attempted diversion. “It’s important enough to you that you both thought and said it.”

“It popped into my head, that’s all. ” His Padawan's voice is growing increasingly tense.

“…Ezra.” This time Kanan's voice is insistent. “Just spill it, already.” There’s something here that matters. Something that instinctively Kanan knows is worth all this continued probing.

“It means ‘defective merchandise is the purview of the chump’ okay?” The teenager finally snaps out in reply. 

They both fall silent after that. And Force, doesn’t that just leave a bitter taste in Kanan’s mouth. “Ezra,” He begins again after a moment, because people aren’t parts to be bought or sold. Or shouldn't be in any society that's working. Surely Ezra knows that.

The teen draws in a breath, his voice suddenly toneless and controlled. “Let’s just…not have this conversation right now, okay?” ‘Or ever.’ Ezra doesn’t acknowledge this thought aloud but he thinks it very clearly. "I'm not in the headspace for it."

Kanan draws a deep breath. Out of the frying pan right into the bonfire so to speak. Given the tension in Ezra’s frame, it's probably best to regroup and come back around to this subject later. “Do me a favor, Ezra, and crash here this evening okay?” Kanan wants his Padawan close by tonight, and after he’s had time to meditate and think things through a little bit longer, they can hopefully try and tackle this topic again in the morning.

Ezra grimaces. “I …really don’t think that’s a good idea right now, Kanan.”

“Why not? Your bed’s the same as it's ever been. This way if you wake up halfway through the night again, I can just put you back under.” And Ezra wouldn't have to wake tomorrow with the druggy aftermath typical of sedatives. There are some distinct advantages, after all, to the judicious use of an occasional force suggestion.

“If we’re going to be leaving for Alderaan than I need to go back to the dorms and pick up a couple of things beforehand. "

“…And that can't wait until tomorrow?” ‘For Sith’s sake kid, kriffing let someone in…’ Kanan's Padawan is drowning, and they both know it, and Kanan's more than willing to help. He's eager to help. So why does Ezra always have to be so Force-cursed stubborn about accepting even the most basic sorts of personal assistance from those around him?

Ezra’s voice in frustrated and weary, as he responds to the words Kanan hasn't actually even vocalized. “And this, Kanan? This is exactly why I keep this type of stuff to myself. Because talking about this kriff never helps anything, historically speaking. Everybody just winds up tired and frustrated instead. ”

"...Historically speaking?" That statement brings Kanan's head up like a viper, honing in. 

Ezra just shrugshis shoulders, “Just ask all the people back on Lothol who wanted me around during harvest time, yeah but never let me stay through the coldest part of the winter, no matter how hard I worked. It’s my poodoo, Kana, and I have plenty of practice with shoveling it on my own, I really do. But doesn't mean that I don't get a little tired of having my face rubbed repeatedly in my own stink.”

And that's just it. ‘Enough. Enough already.’ A heart after all can only survive being stepped on so many times before you either have to crush it underfoot or pick it up off the damn floor. He knows at this point which option he's picking. He tugs the kid forward and into another hug – this time fiercer than any previous. ‘Ezra : you. are. not. defective.’ 

Ezra startles at the thought in his mind as well as at Kanan's sudden physical action, but makes no effort to fight the embrace, simply accepting the gesture without words for several long minutes.

“You’re a total sap, you do know that right?” Ezra finally gives up and murmurs into Kanan’s clavicle after several minutes. He hasn’t said anything else, but he’s made no attempt to escape Kanan’s hold either. Mostly he just seems strangely resigned to his entire situation. Kanan decides for the moment that he'll take that as at least a little progress.

“Sometimes, yes.” Kanan’s pretty sure at this point in his life he’s faced worse accusations. 

“So are we *done* hugging now?” Ezra’s next question has a clear if soft thread of amusement in it.

Kanan considers the question for a moment, noting the kid's gradually easing body language than shakes his head, “Nah. Ask me again in another couple of minutes.”

A silent huff of laughter shakes the smaller frame with those words, “You know, if this whole emergent pattern of repeated hugging is going to be the price of what I told you all the other night, then I’m starting to think maybe I need to set some standard rates for all this unsolicited cuddling. Or, you know, at least demand a few hours off from standard meditation or something...”

Kanan snorts and lightly boxes the back of his Padawan's head. “How about you try just shutting it and hugging me back? How's that for an acceptable option?”

"All right." Ezra does so- a little awkwardly at first perhaps, but without further complaint. Kanan’s relieved to sense that after another minute or so his Padawan’s mental shielding also starts relaxing as well. Not a lot,of course, but Kanan'll take whatever progress he can manage.

“So…we should probably think about leaving the Fresher sometime soon,” Ezra murmurs after a moment, “Before, you know, the pair of stalkers that we’re not supposed to know about lurking out there assume we’ve fallen into the toilet and *drown* during this conversation or something.”

Kanan hmmms, considering the prospect for a moment. Ezra’s entirely right about the watch guard outside, though Kanan also can’t entirely blame Hera or Chopper for hovering right now, especially after their most recent conversation. “You up for more food, Kid? Because if you are I'm pretty sure that there’s enough for another round of what we had for supper still in the kitchen.”

“Does saying yes mean that mean that I'd both have to interact with other people and be civil while doing it? Because I have to be honest, Kanan, that’s a high order right now for me...”

Kanan grimaces, shifting their positions just slightly.

“Ezra before we go back out there - and for the record this is probably the first thing I should have mentioned when I came in here. I’m sorry that Hera sideswiped you the way that she did about you needing to have a medical checkup. Ambushing you with the topic was never my desire or my intention. But for the record, Kid, she didn't know that we'd agreed to table the topic, and I do agree with her that you need to think about getting a medical exam done, just to be safe about things.”

He feels the teenager’s microflinch as Ezra pulls back from the embrace, apparently having finally hit his limit in this conversation in terms of accepting physical affection. Ezra exhales raggedly. “Kriff, Kanan…can this be another of those topics that we avoid discussing for a while longer please?”

“Considering how much this subject, in particular, is already overdue? No - that doesn’t so much work for me right now.” Kanan sighs and rubs the back of his neck, “Look, I know you value your privacy, Ezra…but there’s got to be a middle ground on the subject- a solution that doesn’t batter your dignity into the ground and still reassures all of the rest of us that you’re reasonably healthy.”

“And non-contagious? Because I already paid for a basic checkup and a full course of mass spectrum antibiotics 'after,' if that's what's really the issue here, Kanan. I can already tell you, that you guys are safe - all my bloodwork came back clean. ”

Kanan blinks at that, frankly left speechless by the comment. 

Ezra chuckles at his flummoxed expression, “Medical care back on Lothol was never impossible to get, Kanan, just too expensive for me to bother with on what you'd call a regular basis. They wouldn’t take minor children at any of the free clinics without proper documentation and parental consent, thanks to Imperial regulation. So I was always limited to treatment 'under the table' – usually meaning via gang doctors or one of the local chop shop clinics…” 

Ezra grimaces a little bit. “Which always got the job done, but didn't exactly meet most people's definitions of 'necessarily sanitary.'”

God, Kanan’s going to be sick. Ezra really needs to have a checkup on Alderaan. Hera’s right about that, and Kanan also now needs to scrub out his mind’s eye after this particular conversation. Preferably with some steel wool and some very strong bleach. “Ezra? Look, I’m exhausted right now …and we've both had a long day. So I strongly suggest that unless you want to see me have a literal stroke before this conversation ends, we should table this and pick it back up tomorrow morning. Until then, if I can guarantee that you can do so in private, will you at least try to eat again?” 

“I guess, yeah. Probably.”

“Then that’s our curre t plan. We go get you some food and get you back to your room in that order. Or you can always eat in mine if Zeb’s in yours. He probably won't be...he had plans after dinner with Alexandr. Now, do you have anything here on ship clean clothes-wise that will do for tomorrow?”

“No…but I can always put what I’ve got on now in the clothes fresher.” The teen rubs the back of his neck, his voice begrudging, “Well assuming any of my old sleep stuff here actually fits me anymore, anyway. Lately, it feels like I've been growing so fast KAnan, I’m down in resupply practically every other week…”

“What can I say, Kid, that’s what happens when you sprout up for the sky over the course of a single year like some kind of freakish, force touched pole bean.”

Ridiculous as it is to try and picture it some days, Hera claims that Ezra’s grown at least six and a half inches in the most recent months – and Kanan believes it after hugging him today. Sometimes, he has to wonder though, what exactly is getting secretly mixed into Ezra’s meal portions in the commissary by the mess staff. He’s seriously starting to suspect growth hormones must be involved. 

“If it comes down to it Ezra, I’m fairly sure you’ll only *half* swim in a pair of my old sleeping pants these days if I need to lend you a pair.”

Ezra snorts at that comment, “Are you back to being bitter about the fact that I’m probably going to end up taller than you again, Kanan? Because, I have to say, Master that's just really, really, sad.”

Kanan doesn’t bother to hide his smirk or hold back the well-deserved shoulder shove, the comment earns Ezra “You go right on telling yourself that, if it makes you feel better. I already know that you’re prone to self-delusion.”

And after everything that’s happened in the past couple of hours, Ezra’s laugh in response as he follows his master from the bathroom toward the galley is both bright and doubly sweet.


	3. Hitting Bottom (Updated)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Hera is Hera (Read also: Awesome!) and Kanan Jarrus slams into his emotional limits. Also…when you’re rebels and paperwork is for sissies!

“Well?”

“Well?”

Hera slides into the Galley’s booth across the table from where Kanan is working on his third cup off very, very strong caff. (And yes, he’d sprung his normally hoarded stash of the Spiran – he can drink what he wants. What of it?) 

“I believe the two of us agreed earlier that we are due a long conversation, Kanan?”

Kanan groans at the Twi’lek’s pronouncement, slumping back against the cushions on the bench, covering his face with tired hands as he literally prays for a moment for mercy. “Look Hera, this whole kriffing day has been karked up from it's beginning to its end. Can we rain check this for tomorrow evening please?”

She pokes at his drinking mug with one sharp finger. “This is your fourth in under an hour, My Love. Why bother waiting? When you’re obviously not intending to sleep anyway?”

Well, she has a valid point there, Kanan acknowledges with a little sigh. “Believe me, Hera. This stuff,” He gestures to the cup, “...is not what I *want* to be drinking right now, unfortunately. I’d be dumping out our emergency stash just to be on the safe side if Chopper hadn’t already found and thoroughly hidden all the on ship liquor from me.” Because yes it has been that bad of a past couple of weeks.

Hera’s hand reaches out for his, her fingers enfolding his own and squeezing them tightly for a moment. "All the more reason, Kanan, for you to spill it. If that's where you are right now Love, then you better *get talking.*”

“I don’t have the will for a fight right now Hera, and the one that’s probably coming if I start this discussion right now is too karking important for me to mess up by going into it handicapped by exhaustion.”

“I didn’t ask for a fight, Kanan. I just asked you to be honest with me.”

“About?”

“Well you’re the one who’s craving a bottle right now, so how about you pick the topic... What is it that's gotten you there? I'm not in your head, Kanan, so I don't know. So you start and I 'll let you know if it looks like we’ve slipped out of relevant and into avoidant sorts of territory.”

Well that’s fair enough. "My Padawan is kriffed in the head, Hera.“

"…And this is news to you suddenly?” And damn it, Kanan can literally hear her perfect eyebrow raising slightly. The response is typical of Hera, in these highly charged moments, but right now it just makes him angry. He inhales, then exhales, breathing harshly. “No Hera. In this case, I really, really, don’t think that you’re hearing me.”

Her tone softens slightly. “Then tell me again, and this time Kanan, I promise to leave out the sarcasm."

“Ezra’s karking kriff’d, Hera. Damn near close to irreparably. His psyche’s such a torn, ripped up mess of betrayals and violations right now that I can’t really let myself dwell on the extent of the damage. Because if I do? I’m going to either start screaming or crying or hitting things. And Ezra can’t afford for me to do any of those things at the moment. I’m the closest thing to a functional ally at his power level that he’s got available right now. We can’t both be courting full on traumatic disassociation, no matter how reasonable a response that would be. Because do you want to know the worst part of all this, Hera? What he mentioned in the bar the other night? That was essentially nothing. That was just the karking sprinkles on top of his 'buy one get three free' trauma sundae that makes up the borders of his *entire kriffing personal history.*” 

Kanan pauses, inhales a sharp angry breath. “How fluent are you in native Lotholian, Hera?”

She blinks at that, a little nonplussed, a lot confused by the question, “I'm reasonably so…” He nods, then quotes back Ezra’s quote from earlier. This time with its direct Basic and Rylian translations along for the ride. Hera pauses, rubs at the base of one of her Lek. “Kanan - love, I can tell that this is important just from your face, I really can, but I’m clearly missing something here in terms of the context.”

Kanan snorts at that, slams back the rest of his current drink, and gets up to go rinse the mug under the faucet, his whole body gradually succumbing to increasingly angry tremors as he finally makes himself speak. “'Only chumps buy things that are obviously broken.' *That* was Ezra's direct - if completely unintentional - answer to why he avoids talking about his past when I asked him about it earlier, Hera. He thinks that he’s essentially no better than merchandise, Hera, because that lesson's been reinforced to him over and over since his early childhood by an ENTIRE KARKING PLANET. And for three kriffing years I completely failed to look and actually see it.”

“We.” Hera’s voice is one part soft, one part firm when she speaks up again.

“What?” He answers back, his tone confused, his posture tight, his frustration still rapidly rising.

“We didn’t see Ezra pain, Kanan. Not just you. All the rest of us were here as well. If there’s failure here to shoulder, then it’s not on 'you,' it's on 'we'.”

“Banthashit!" Kanan all but shouts, "Ezra is *my* Padawan. I’m the one who's responsible for his training. Not to mention that I'm the one who's tied to his head via a Force damned two-way psychic link!”

"And you think that makes him any less mine too!?” Hera shoves her hand against his chest hard. “Because I seem to remember being the one who wanted him first and fought for him first while you were still sorting through your kriff, Kanan Jarrus! You don't own the monopoly where Ezra is concerned just because he's Jedi too!" Those words cool Kanan's temper some, if only just slightly. Though Hera's own rant isn't anywhere near complete yet. "Zeb’s his bloody roommate, Kanan. Sabine sees him as her best friend - even if she’d never admit it aloud to most people. We all live out of each other’s back pockets ...live and fight and love and bleed. If Ezra belongs to anyone but himself at this point in his life, then it’s definitely all of us now not just one single person. And as for his current psychological damage?” She draws in a ragged breath. “You’re not the only one who’s been kicking their own ass lately for lack of better targets! We've been here too, Love! You’re not the only one who missed the forest for too long because of all the trees. ”

She doesn’t *understand.* "...I’m kriffing linked to his head, Hera, I’m regularly inside of his shielding. I should have …“

"What?! Seen the shape of universe in its entire complexity? I hate to break it to you Atlas, but omniscience isn’t a skill set that's currently available to anyone. We all just do the best that we possibly can.”

And Sith and damnation, now Kanan’s crying. Or as close as he can get to that act anymore. His nails are digging into the palms of his hands, his breath is too fast in his chest - both of his temples are throbbing. “His head…his whole damn life, Hera…! Force, I’m just SO KRIFFING ANGRY!!!” And Kanan can’t get it out. Doesn’t know how to anymore, when literal days of meditation are just not working. “Right now I just want to karking destroy something!”

“I know, and I get it, Kanan. Just take a look at our damn lack of crockery at present.”

“SOMEONE HAS TO STAY SANE.” He repeats the internalized mantra yet again. “One of us has to keep it under control right now, if Ezra is going to survive this...”

And then Hera’s in front of him, grabbing his hands where they’re shaking at his sides, and leaning up on her tiptoes to literally snarl the next words into his face. “You’re right, Kanan Jarrus. Someone has to stay sane. And tonight? That someone is *me!*”

She shakes his upper arms hard enough to rattle his teeth. “Damn it, let it *go*, Kanan. They’ve taken enough from Ezra already; don’t you dare give them any more power over any of the rest of us too, not *voluntarily.*”

And that? That’s just it. Something rips free in the back of Kanan's mind like a massive storm door suddenly banging open and Force Damn Them All - Kanan hadn’t remembered the feel of this kind of whole body weeping. He hasn’t experienced this kind of unwavering agony since the night that Depa Billaba died. But he remembers it now - he remembers this stage of grief completely.

Thank the kriffing Force, some part of Kanan notes in a distant part of his mind, that he’d managed to convince Ezra to let him knock him out for the night when he’d finally managed to wrestle the Kid into a pair of his oldest, smallest sleep pants a couple of hours ago. Because Kanan has no doubt that the poor kid would've had a full-on heart attack, had he seen his master literally imploding right now. Ezra'd have taken it as proof he was right in his policy of personal secrecy.

The floor feels cold under Kanan's palms as he crumbles down, but that’s okay. He welcomes the respite from the seemingly relentless internal heat that he feels building under his skin right now. He needs at least some part of him to be numb at the moment, because it feels a lot like every bit of rage and grief he's ever felt in his life is flaring up like a massive, hungry bonfire inside of him right now.

Kanan lets the emotion go, and prays the blaze inside will go out eventually.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Hera, bless her soul, doesn’t try to baby talk or soothe him. She doesn’t tell him it’s okay, or that it ever will be again. Instead she just sits down on the floor, and lays a firm hand on the center of his back. It lays there like a weighted anchor, a soothing kind of focus even as he weeps. She keeps it there until the worst of the emotional storm front passes through – leaving him both relieved and strangely empty. Until Kanan lifts his own neck enough to wipe moisture from his bare face with one of his hands, then push some of the hair that's slipped free of his ponytail up and back.

“Better?“ She asks quietly.

"No.” And Force - he’s got snot pouring out of what feels like every facial orifice he's got at the moment, and it’s completely disgusting.

Her voice holds …a little bit of a smile? “That’s okay. We still have a whole box of crockery in one of the lockers downstairs if you end up needing it.”

“Does it actually help?” Force does Kanan have to sound so hopeful, so utterly, brokenly pathetic at the idea?

“Never underestimate the cathartic value of a little harmless destruction of personal property..,” Hera's voice is droll. "Physical outlets like that work for a reason, Love."

“I liked those dishes, you know.” And Force when did he become so kriffing whiny? That’s got to be the dumbest thing that’s ever come out of his mouth.

“I ...didn’t. Which is ironic, on so many levels. Since they were a gift from my Dad and, even if he never brought it up directly, I’m pretty sure he actually meant them to be part of a new heirloom style hope chest or something like that.”

“So they weren’t your mother's, then?” That somehow makes Kanan feel vaguely better about the whole situation.

“Oh KRIFF NO.” Hera actually giggles, pulling back her arm slowly as Kanan gradually shifts back from his facing down crouch into a more casual seated position. “My mom was many things during her life Kanan, but she couldn’t even *boil water* worth a damn! If my dad hadn’t been a decent cook by the time that they met and married then all three of us would have starved long before I ever reached my majority.”

“You really didn’t like the dishes?” He asks her a little curiously.

“They were ugly and clunky. They looked better in pieces than they ever did whole. Kark, even Sabine agrees with me there She had an absolute ball helping with their destruction. I don’t think I’ve seen her actually laughing at anything so genuinely since… Well since that night in the Cantina to speak frankly. Hera sighs then, tired and deep, “She’s pretty torn up too right now, by the way…she keeps looking for trouble everywhere she goes. Probably because just like you, Kanan, she blames herself for everything that’s happened since that night. Even though it all really comes down to Ezra’s pride or his pain finally just breaking under the weight of one unintendedly insulting comment.”

Kanan chuckles weakly in reply to that, “Don’t worry, I promise that the next time that I see her, I’ll set her straight on who's corned the useless guilt market where Ezra's concerned these days.”

Hera lightly cuffs one side of his head. "Oh no, you don’t, Kanan. No swan diving into that particular swamp of uselessness again. The ones – the only ones - who get to shoulder any of the blame for the past two weeks are also the ones whom actually did all of this to Ezra. The assholes, whom, for obvious reasons, better karking well pray that they remain forever anonymous. Because if they don't then they're going to end up maimed eventually.“

"Ezra’s not going to give us any IDs of his attackers, Hera.” Kanan sighs deeply, pushing back a loose bit of hair that’s flopped forward over his forehead with one of his hands again. "As I just said, he's more likely to slit his own throat right now then he is to volunteer anything further about his past voluntarily.“

"Yet he seems to be talking to you just fine, Kanan.” Hera’s voice, no doubt meant to be encouraging, is nonetheless softly contradicting.

Kanan shrugs his shoulders a little, “Well yeah, I guess. But Hera's that's only because I'm basically practicing a rather ruthless - if admittedly benevolent - form of pursuit predation on him right now.” 

"Huh?" Hera blinks at him, her expression clearly questioning.

Kanan circles his head halfway around the joint at the base of his neck, hearing cervical vertebrae popping as he does so. “He's...look Ezra’s so exhausted right now by everything that's happening right now that he can't *help* but keep crashing in a discernable pattern over and over again. That's just, as they'd say, the nature of his particular beast at present. Literally, all I’m doing to get him to talk, Hera, is showing up just before he crashes and hugging him when he bears his throat at me instead of attacking or abandoning him. Once I do so, he's usually so shell-shocked and vulnerable as a result that I can get a few minutes of actual conversation either into or out of him as a result. ”

“Gods.” Hera sounds like she wants to be sick at that confession. Kanan more than identifies with that reaction. It's not a particularly gentle strategy, he knows, but it's working a little at least, and either way it's literally all that he's got to help Ezra at the moment.

He clears his throat, then, wincing. "Do you know what he thinks about why we're dragging him to a clinic on Alderaan, Hera?“ Kanan forces out a harsh laugh, "He thinks you’re afraid he’s *contagious or something.* That he represents a physical threat to the ship of some kind you're not willing to tolerate without further treatment. He actually gave me a whole spiel about getting himse;ftested after his ‘last time’ - whatever the kriff that’s supposed to imply." Kanan chokes on the thought in sick disbelief, "He's the one who got attacked and traumatized several times over, Hera and yet we're the ones allowed to be reassured in the wake of it, apparently.”

Hera closes her eyes tight, making a low sound of pain. “Kanan, we both know exactly what 'after his last time' probably actually implies.” 

Kanan sighs, dropping his head down toward his chest. “Yeah, we do, Hera. Not that I’m up to talking about it in specific anymore than Ezra is, at the moment anyway. That comment he dropped the other night about being trapped by his hair just…” He shudders hard. “I saw some pretty messed up stuff too as you well know, during my initial days on the streets after Depa first died. And probably the worst of those times...” Kanan doesn't finish explaining. He knows Hera can draw her own conclusions. He doesn't need to blend his memory of that with his mental images of of Ezra, frankly speaking.

“I suspected even before that night,” Hera mutters softly. “But I convinced myself that we'd miraculously dodged that particular bullet where Ezra was concerned because he was so good at surviving by other means. I didn’t want to be right, Kanan, so I closed my eyes and chose to look away. I didn’t want to push him if I didn’t have to. Which in the end? Was just plain cowardly on my part.“

"You still did better than me, Hera.” He sighs, “ I mean I pretty much openly embraced willful ignorance in favor of pretending that he’s actually Mr Snarky Go Lucky instead of just plays him occasionally on holovid. It wasn't even hard, Hera! Ezra holds the guise so damn well, it’s easier to buy it than push him most of the time.”

“I know. “ Hera squeezes his hand. “Sabine said pretty much the same thing to Zeb and I just the other night. Kriff, Zeb says it’s almost like it's a game that he plays with himself every bit as much as he plays it with the rest of us. Slip on the costume, avoid all mirrors and keep on going, and sooner or later you'll either die from your wounds or you just stop bleeding.”

Kanan nods at the analogy, exhaling softly before moving onto the next topic, “You know, it was all I could do just to keep him on The Ghost after talking to him last night. He wanted off of the ship something awful, Hera. We're going to need to watch him...for the next few weeks at least.”

“You think he’s an actual flight risk, hen? How angry is he with us about the whole involuntary medical checkup?”

“He’s definitely uncomfortable, Hera - with generous side orders of both numb and embarrassed. Though it's not so much that he's feeling angry as Ezra's humiliated in advance. Which really makes no sense since it's also him who went out of his way to tell me that we don’t need to worry about his being contagious. I mean Ezra's apparently already paid out of pocket for an exam and a bunch of screening blood tests, so why is going through it again this embarrassing for him?”

Unless of course, Kanan knows, there's something more involved that he and Hera aren't yet seeing.

“He couldn’t go to one of the free clinics on Lothol to get that done after?” Hera sounds more than a little appalled at this new information. But then again that's hardly surprising. They’d both seen how skinny Ezra had been when he’d initially come aboard The Ghost. How a kid that starved had managed to afford expensive private lab-work on his hand to mouth budget was another highly uncomfortable question, mostly involving the internal mental calculation of how many days it had meant that Ezra almost inevitably didn’t get to eat as a result.

“They apparently don’t treat minor children without both ID and parental consent on Lothol - even in the charity clinics. Ezra implied that it had something to do with Imperially mandated regulations, which I can pretty much believe. It makes sense they'd do so, Hera, if only for census related reasons." Kanan draws in a deep breath. “Hera – speaking of such, are we going to end up running into the same problem if we try and get him checked over while we’re in Alderaan’s capital city when he go there? Because remember, Dev Morgan’s in the Imperial system now as Ezra Bridger. His old cover is completely compromised at this point. And we don’t have any other ID for Ezra …at least not in terms of paperwork that can stand up to close prolonged scrutiny.” 

Nor Kanan knows, do they have anything that names either of them as either Ezra's parent or his guardian. To be fair, there's really never been the need before now for it. There’s rarely been any point in concerning themselves with such details out here on The Rim - especially not in terms of formalized legal or medical documentation. Their healthcare after all, has always involved the triaging of various illnesses and injuries as they occurred on the spot, occasionally getting assistance from the fleet for higher level treatments or issues, like when Kanan had suddenly been blinded.

Unfortunately those kind of piecemeal arrangements are going to count for nothing on a planet like Alderaan in one of its larger clinics. Especially if said clinic followed mandatory rules of reporting when faced with suspected child abuse victims. All it would really take was one overzealous person making the wrong call and things could rapidly descend to real threat instead of simple annoyance. Without the right paperwork - without the right cover identity - any check Ezra had that turned up proof of previous abuse could get him automatically flagged in Alderaan’s imperially regulated medical system. Which could place them all under further scrutiny and cause a formal medical investigation.

Because after all, no matter how little Ezra's reaching his majority actually matters to either Kanan or Hera or the Imperials (albeit for completely opposite reasons) Ezra still has another nine months and eight days until he officially turns eighteen. Which means as far as Alderaan's social services are concerned, anyway that Ezra would be seen as displaced, orphaned minor with absolutely no claimable ties to any of them.

A displaced orphaned minor already smack dab in the 'highly vulnerable' category.


	4. Too Much and Too Little Honesty (Updated)

“It isn’t a problem.”

“Ezra.”

“It *isn’t* going to be a problem, Kanan.”

“…Ezra.”

“It *really* isn’t going to be a probl…“ 

“Ezra…”

"Oh for Force Sake's, Kanan, will you just let me finish please?!" The teenager's voice is aggravated and weary, and they're not even through their breakfast yet. "For once in my entire kirffing life may I be allowed to relieve instead of create someone's anxiety?!"

Silence. 'Well all right then.' Kanan thinks to himself drawing in a deep breath, holding it, then exhaling it out through his nose. "All right, Kid, you're right. I'm sorry and I'm listening. For now anyway."

Ezra relaxes, at least a little. "It isn't a problem Kanan. Not the 'Alderaan situation' and not Imperial medical regulations. Though well okay maybe those might still be annoying in the short term at the clinic. But it's not like we'll be returning for any kind of treatment after one appointment though. What I'm trying to say right now is that you and Hera don't have to worry about the paperwork issues. Because well yes it's true that yes, Dev Morgan's cover is blown beyond any hope of usefulness at this point: Surprise Master! I already have new and *great* fake ID!"

Kanan pauses at that announcement- completely still - for the space of a couple of seconds, blinking. Then he recovers, puts his cup of tea down on the Ghost’s circular table and crosses his arms over his chest. “Define ‘great.’ He commands a little suspiciously.

“Present from Hondo.” Ezra responds back equally bluntly.

“*Ezra!*” This time it’s less a word than it is a kriffing growl. Ezra just shifts on the bench, lifting his hands up in the air defensively.

“Hey it’s not like I *asked* him to do it, Kanan. He just kept insisting that he owed me!”

“For what?!”

Ezra waffles “…I probably shouldn’t answer that?”

“For what reason?”

“Plausible deniability.”

“*EZRA BRIDGER!*” Kanan honestly doesn't know at this point if he actually has enough sanity left for this kriffing conversation.

"Look…just...it happened a long time ago and has been completely resolved, collaterally speaking. Let's just say that Hondo and I 'bonded,' back during one of our mutual little adventures, and if he wants to dote on me occasionally as a result, then I'm not going to try and stop him. He's all but alone, real family wise, now, Kanan. And I see no good reason to deliberately hurt his feelings."

Kanan sighs and drops his forehead down onto the table between them with dull thunk, “Because of course,” He mutters very dryly, “Ethically questionable Space Pirates deserve kindness and empathy, clearly.”

“Life is all about making connections, Kanan. And being willing to open up yourself to other living beings.”

Kanan lifts his head from the table, glaring a little at his Padawan. “Seriously? You’re seriously gonna try to use that one right now? On me!?”

Ezra shrugs, “If the shoe fits, Master...”

“Then wear the karking boots instead!” Kanan snaps back automatically.

Ezra simply snorts back at that reply. And okay but seriously - when did Kanan lose control of this conversation?!

Ezra shrugs his shoulders again and then sighs and picks back up his cooling cup of caf, taking a long drink before continuing “Besides,” the younger Jedi mutters into the rim of his stone mug, “Do you have *any* idea at all of the price that you’d actually have to pay out of pocket for something like….I don’t know about you Kanan, but I *enjoy* having savings.”

Kanan does know as a matter of fact. Not that that is something that they are going to be discussing at this particular time. He would at least like to pretend in this subject that he has some actual high ground. This kid is enough of tiger-that-he’s-grasping-by-the-tail already.

“I’m just saying, I don’t know…maybe you could take it as a good sign, Kanan? For once in our lives... a problem shared and a problem solved all in a little under two minutes. Force, you could even call it a blessing!”

“I’ll call it a trap.” Kanan responds back to him more than a little bit darkly. 

“Cynic,” Ezra frowns, and then the younger man shifts, and speaks again a little bit more patiently. “Look Kanan, I’ll be the first to admit to you that sometimes Hondo’s, well… a little bit shady…”

“A little? A *little* shady he says..”

“But he genuinely, for reasons I don’t fully understand, Master, has a soft spot for Jedi in general, and for yours truly in particular. Do you honestly think he’s going to somehow betray me to the empire like this, Kanan, when he’s still trying actively to recruit me…?”

Kanan sighs heavily, conceding defeat for the time being. “So how long exactly have you been in possession of this, and I quote, ‘really really good ID?’”

“It was only one ‘great,’ Master. And since my last birthday, Kanan.”

“…And the age listed on said ID is?”

“Uhm …Either nineteen or twenty?”

Kanan rolls his eyes, “Of course it is. Because I couldn’t clearly see *that* one coming…”

Ezra only shrugs completely unapologetically, “It only makes sense, Kanan! I’ll be eighteen in less than a year now. Kriff with my hair cut short these days, like it is I’m pretty effective at passing as over majority age already. Sure I have to make a couple of jokes about my damn baby face occasionally, but whatever, it works.”

Kanan groans “Kid, must you really just keep digging yourself in deeper and deeper here?!”

Ezra responds to *that* comment by rolling his eyes heavenward. “What - are *you* really going to try and lecture *me* about the ethical implications of operating under personas, Kanan? Cause one - I don’t know about you, Master, but I like being able to get antibiotics and other things like that when I need them from reputable places now instead of the alternative. And two? I’m pretty sure that your whining about my having a fake ID at this point in my life is sorta like the wolf cussing out the lion when it catches it stalking the sheep!”

Kanan shuts his mouth. Then he opens it once more. Then shuts it again. Wisely. “All right, all right – on this topic I’ll cede.” At least temporarily anyway. But if Ezra thinks that he’s going to win this argument entirely in the long run then he’s clearly delusional, because… well, Kriff It, because Kanan just *gets to win* some of the arguments like these.

“Good. See I was right, Kanan, and it wasn’t even all that difficult or painful to acknowledge it in this particular case.” Ezra sighs a little. “Now, that we’ve established that fact, Kanan could you maybe try and look a little less conflicted about the entire situation? As opposed to, I don’t know, me having to watch you sit there looking like I just did something nasty to your baby...” 

Kanan’s scowl is markedly dour, ‘Kid in case you missed the memo, you technically *are* what passes for my ‘baby’…he thinks to himself, 'And you’re running circles around me right now. Which no, doesn’t do much for ‘lowering my kriffing anxiety.’

Ezra isn’t done speaking himself yet, though, “Hey – it’s not like I’m buying Death Sticks or Spice or gorging on alcohol or anything, Kanan! Kriff, I’ve never even used the thing to buy *porn* – there are frankly better ways to spend you money. Which according to the rest of Pheonix squadron is *totally* unnatural and freakish of me.’’ The teenager shrugs his shoulders.

Well, if the kid is going to give him *that* big of an opening, then karking right he's taking it. Even if it hadn’t exactly been on the morning’s original itinerary. With Ezra, Kanan has learned, you played your cards as you got them because you never knew when you’ll have a better chance again. 

Which is why Kanan uncrosses his arms, drops his voice an octave or two and regards the teen seriously and sympathetically for a long moment before speaking. “There’s nothing wrong with taking your time with stuff like that, Ezra.” He replies, “Buying…pictures and holovids and stuff, it doesn't provide the same kick for everybody. Some people just need more connection than that. And no, despite what your buddies in Pheonix squadron might have implied that doesn’t actually make you a freak. Especially given your particular history.” 

Ezra stares at him, horrified for a moment or so, before bursting back into speech in clear protest. “Oh Karabast, Kanan…Just stop! Before you make my karking ears bleed! That last bit about the porn was a *joke,* Master - meant to knock you out of your current funk! Not to get you to try and start ‘the sex talk’ with me!” 

“No?” Kanan raises an eyebrow in challenge, a little bemused by his Padawan’s sheer level of apparent horror. 

“Kark No!” Ezra echoes back emphatically. “To speak very frankly, Kanan, I’d rather live in a Sarlacc, indefinitely!”

“Yeah, well suck it up, Kid.” Kanan warns, pointing his finger at him, his expression unbending, “Because I’ll raincheck on the topic at present if you insist. But is definitely *going* to be happening in the very near future, Ezra. Along with a couple other ‘slightly’ overdue conversations.” He puts the last words in air quotes deliberately. Said discussion is in fact number three on what Kanan’s taken to mentally calling his ‘Grow Up And Act Like A Force Damned Parent’ list. Ezra is going to hate everything on said list- probably with all the passion in his adolescent soul - but Kanan’s presently more than prepared to live with it. There are just too many things on said list that have already been put off too long. There is a big difference, Kanan’s come to realize in the past two weeks, between benign unknowing and outright neglect.

“Kanan…” Ezra’s voice stutters to a stop at what he sees on his master’s face, and then the younger man's voice drops off, before he shifts uncomfortably in his seat. All right then, given the previous wild course of this whole conversation, Kanan’s going to take that redirection as a necessary thing. At least now he's certain that he has Ezra’s full, undivided attention.

“As I said Ezra, the timing on most of those talks is negotiable, but the discussions themselves aren’t going to be. Welcome officially to Temple Course J207: Being an Adult in Actual Kriffing Reality. It only seems fair Kid under the circumstances, with your majority birthday coming up so fast, that we at least start preparing you for the inevitable.”

Ezra’s voice is strange when he speaks out next – not angry, or upset, simply oddly detached and restrained. Kanan can sense but not follow the flood of thoughts currently rushing through his Padawan's head behind his current shielding. “And if I point out that I’ve already had more of ‘Adult 101’ than most people my age, Kanan, thanks to my ‘eclectic education’ and I tell you that I'm done with talking about certain subjects at this point? What then…?”

“Then we discuss and review, anyway.” Kanan cuts him off calmly, “Regarding the biggest and most important stuff under each topic at least, Ezra. Because, through no fault of your own Kid– and note I'm saying that clearly up front, I’m not exactly inclined to think said ‘eclectic education’ was necessarilythe kind likely to leave you with a particularly healthy or balanced view of certain topics.”

Ezra’s breathing jerks a little in reply that, and he turns his head away sharply. “Understood.” 

Then inside Ezra's head, not meant to be heard but nonetheless coming straight through down through their the link like a kriffing freight shuttle. ‘Hondo’s offer’s looking better and better to me every day now.’ 

Kanan grimaces, and reinforces his own end of their link. When the kid's this upset, he thinks a little wryly, Ezra really really needs to work on his personal shielding.

Kanan considers all of this for a moment or two, while the two of them sit quietly, and then he makes another slightly grimmer decision. It may not be time for the two of them to have sex talk, but it is clearly the point at which they need to cover one of the other topics (#1) that he’s got written on his list. Well there's no time as they say, quite like the present.

“Look, Ezra-“ Kanan takes a deep breath, and begins, not at all unsympathetically. “I know that the past few weeks have been hard on you, Kid. I do get that. And to be honest Ezra, I don’t think anyone your age likes talking about the kind of things we’re going to have to tackle. Even before we consider your personal history. That said, Ezra...” He leans forward a little, “Those escape routes of yours that you’ve been mapping out in your head over the last couple weeks whenever you start thinking that things seem just a little too irrecoverable at the moment? Bad Idea, Kid. Very, *very* bad idea. If you honestly think that *any* of us are just going to sit here and watch you try and walk away *now*– particularly after everything that’s just happened,” Kanan scoffs a little at the idea, “Well, you *obviously* don’t know any of us as well as you seem to think you do.”

Ezra’s face turns back toward him then, clearly startled. His next works are literally stuttered. “I…I h…haven’t been…”

“Banthashit.” Kanan cuts him off, very calmly, “In some of your darker moments, Ezra you’ve been chewing away at the notion almost obsessively.” The older Jedi taps the side of his temple then. “And when you’re stressed out, Kid, you don’t always shield as well as you seem to think that you do.”

Kanan knows that he’s right – even without the sound of his Padawan's breathing or the flares in Ezra’s force sense to confirm it. He knows because he’s felt Ezra's repeated struggle with the compulsion to run. Initially as a compulsion to flee all Kanan's own, which he’d honestly been confused by at first until he’d finally traced back to where the original feeling actually sourced from.

“I won’t. I wouldn’t.” Ezra’s voice is still a little shaky as his Padawan finally speaks, but it honestly doesn’t feel as if the kids is trying to lie to him outright. At least as far as Kanan can tell. Which is good as far as Kanan can tell.

But it doesn’t mean they’re finished yet. Not by a long shot.

“I’m glad to hear it.” Kanan informs him, soberly, “Because that’s not the kind of moment that we’re *trying* to force you into right now. As I said there is *time,* Ezra. Literally, as much and as long as you need. We can go as slow or as fast at dealing with all of this as is required Kid, just so long as there is some measure of actual healing and movement occurring.”

Ezra inhales again, this time slightly more sharply, and Kanan gets the distinct impression that his Padawan’s actually fighting back tears. “All that acknowledged, and for the purpose of being explicitly clear, Ezra, if you try and bolt on me Kid, I will be coming after you. Do you hear me? I *will*. Consider that a threat, consider it a promise… Force consider it whatever the kriff you need to right now, just as long as you ‘get me.’ ‘Out’ is not an option anymore, Ezra. Some people stick around and I am one of them. You are not ditching me in favor of ‘easier on the guise’ – are we clear?” 

“We’re clear.” Ezra’s voice is soft, choked, just little bit phlegmy. He’s definitely crying now, if softly. Not loud scared gasps or fast angry sobs or anything like that at all- something softer than that, and deeper. Something rooted in soil at least a decade or so older, or so Kanan suspects.

Kanan gives him a moment to settle in the silence. Then he speaks again, “You okay?”

“No.” Ezra inhales sharply. Snuffs his nose hard. “But I will be in minute.”

Kanan nods at that answer, “Do you need a hug?”

Ezra scoffs, “Not before I get an hour or two to figure out my cuddle fees first, no Kanan.”

Kanan rolls his eyes at that and settles for shifting the topic of conversation completely. “So, how about you show me where you've managed to squirrel away that ID you were mentioning, Ezra? So we can get it over to Hera, and then the two of us can get to work on the rest of our usual morning training."

Ezra jerks a little at that comment, then snorts softly, still sounding rather phlemy even as he digs into his left hip satchel pocket. "I’ve got it on me actually…but why are we showing it to Hera, Kanan?"

"She's a better judge of detail quality these days than I am, Ezra. Though I’m betting you’re probably right about its quality considering who it actually came from. Be warned though, Ezra I highly doubt when she finds out that you’ve had it this long that Hera’ll be particularly happy."

"Hera doesn’t need to be happy about it,” Ezra says sounding strangely adult in his simple, straight-faced honesty. “I procured something for myself that I felt was genuinely needed to in order to protect myself out here. If Hondo hadn't come through when he did with it, Kanan, I'd have still gone looking elsewhere for the exact same kriffing thing just as soon as I had enough money saved up. Even if the process had cleared out every last bit of my personal savings. And if anyone – even you guys, doesn’t approve of that fact, then that's your prerogative. You don’t get a vote though on this one Kanan– you only get an opinion, because the only alternative would be me stuck living in a way that I’ll never volunatarily accept living again, at least not if I have any say in the matter. And frankly I could never trust anyone fully again who asked me to do so.”

And wow. When the kid doesn’t pull punches, he doesn’t pull punches. Still, “…Ezra.” Kanan sighs out again, because there’s just so much worth hearing and saying there both. So much that's unacknowledged, or newly acknowledged but otherwise largely unspoken between all of them. How anyone can be so simultaneously old and young all at once is an almost inexpressible duality as far Kanan's concerned at the moment

His Padawan meanwhile just sighs dramatically again. “Aaaaaaaand now we’re back to the you repeating my name thing. Seriously, Kanan…”

Kanan cuts straight to the heart of the matter, at least from his own perspective anyway… “I want to ask you something, Ezra…why did you never come to Hera and I, if you were that uncomfortable about the lack of passible ID?” Why hadn’t Ezra sought their protection in that in the same way that he’d accepted their provision in terms of things like training, food and clothing? Was it simply because they'd never actually offered it to Ezra outright as they had everything else? Or did all of this come back to Ezra's obsession with his medical privacy? And if that was the case, then what was he so damned desperate for them not to see?

Ezra meanwhile just gives a little hmmm at the question - clearly considering it seriously for awhile before he answers, “Well besides the now obvious fact that I don’t like being lectured about things as if I’m too dumb to understand what's at stake? I tend to lose my temper when it happens and that almost always ends badly? I didn’t bring it up to you guys before because…well, it was *my* problem, Kanan. Dev was *my* cover initially,after all. His ID was around before the rest of you were, and that made it…oh, I don’t know, it just felt like that made it my responsibility to at least try and deal with it first without help. I mean I go to you guys with the *big stuff*Kanan -when I can’t figure out a way on my own to handle something. Or when you or Hera have specific knowledge that I know you’ve offered to share. That doesn't lessen my responsibility to at least try and fix my problems on my own first. I mean it’s not like I’m a kriffing baby or anything, Kanan.”

“I see.” Kanan nods, sighing at that, heavily.

Ezra shifts again in his chair, and then shrugs, “Hey, sorry if that’s not you wanted to hear, Kanan: but let’s be honest here – on a mission you guys depend on my self-sufficiency on a nearly constant basis. It doesn’t really seem fair for you guys to gripe about now just because this time around it also netted me some unapproved ID instead.”

‘Well yes.’ His Padawan is probably right about that. Every coin has two sides after all, including Ezra’s stubborn independence. But Force, Kanan thinks, a little sadly, that same self-sufficiency streak also makes it incredibly hard sometimes to actually be a parent. Because in some aspects, Kanan, Hera and Ezra are completely backward in in terms of normal parent and child dynamics of dependency. After all, by Kanan's reckoning most parents do everything for their children when they’re very young and wean them slowly over time into a state of greater independence as they're ready for it. Meanwhile, he and Hera are literally going to have to start figuring out ways to encourage Ezra to come to them more often for things without doing it in a way that his Padawan will also take as an insult to his intelligence.

Kanan sighs softly. Maybe he just needs to put together ‘Having parents: a guide for street rats’ hand out or some such thing.

“Kanan? Here...” Kanan blinks a moment, before reaching out for the outstretched ID.

He turns the small packet around in his hands several times – considering it a little bit thoughtfully. Wanting to make certain Ezra’s considered all of its implications as well. “You do realize, don’t you Ezra, that with an adult ID like this one on Alderaan, you’ll basically be expected to through the clinic process alone when we get there. Well unless you specifically invited one of us along for company when you go back to see the doctors anyway. The staff are going to be making you fill out all the paperwork and stuff at the clinic before your examination. They'll be asking you all the history and physical stuff that’ll be required for any additional testing they deem necessary.”

“I know that, Kanan.”

“And you’re okay with that, Ezra? Prepared to deal with that?”

The younger man shrugs, “I don’t see that I have much choice but to be, do I? Hera was pretty explicit, Kanan. This *has* to be done, if I want to keep flying with the rest of the fleet. Or at least I assume so anyway. And other people’s lives are not worth less than my obsession with my own modesty.”

Kanan’s chest tightens at that admission, “Ezra…”

“I’ll be fine, Kanan.” Ezra repeats waving a hand, keeping his voice deliberately light. “It’s not even a full work up anyway. Just a fleet physical – which is apparently far less extensive than a normal pne. I actually looked into the details of that earlier this morning. They’ll want to do a basic system scan and draw some blood, yes but it won’t be super…invasive or anything like that." The boy's tone remains mostly neutral as he speaks, but his breathing picks up a little which Kanan can't help but notice. "At least not really anyway. It isn’t ...it isn't going to…to *hurt* like the other times did, Kanan. There's no need for them to put in stitches or go poking places or other sorts of things like that like they've had to ...well, before.”

“Ezra.” Force, but Kanan feels like he’s got a speeder parked on his chest at the moment. This feels wrong, this *is* wrong they can’t just…” What in kriff is Kanan actually right now? Because he knows what Hera had intended here and it is anything but what any of them are actually getting. Especially if Ezra’s going into the clinic with an adult ID in hand instead of a Minor's one. Because then they won’t have access to any of his medical records outside regular form unless Ezra literally gives them his permission or if Hera gets Sabine to hack them on their way out. Which really is just another deception, another betrayal of Ezra's trust. And if the Kid ever finds out he’s about to retraumatize himself over what amounts to just a pointless lie then he’ll quite likely…

Kanan *can not do this.* He simply can’t.

Ezra’s final question brings all the rest to a skittering to an abrupt halt in his Master head. “Hey, Kanan, I was going to ask you before we got to Alderaan... Do you mind if I list you as my emergency contact and my medical power of attorney when we get to the clinic? From what I understand they usually want to you have one and they generally prefer it to be…well, to be family.”

Kriff and sithspit. This is hell now. They are literally in hell.

Kanan exhales. “Ezra. Yes, I’d be more happy to. You don’t even have to *ask* me that. But now that I think about it, since that we’re pretty much done with breakfast why don’t you make that supply trip back to the Phoenix Dorms that we were talking about last night before we actually start in our training today okay? And also if you don't mind stop and grab some more caf beans in the central market for me. I…I have to talk to Hera about something for a few minutes okay? And I really should get it done before we start our daily sparring.”


	5. Arguments and Understandings (Updated)

“He already has a…”

“Yes. And a good one by the sound of it.” Kanan drops down beside Hera in the co-pilot’s chair. Already grateful beyond measure that he’d made the arbitrary decision to lock the door behind him upon entering the cockpit. True the rest of the Ghost’s crew is all off the Ghost, on other errands right now but Kanan has no idea when they’ll be back, and this is not likely to be either short or a particularly pleasant conversation. Not for either of them, though admittedly for likely very different kinds of reasons.

“He has a fake ID *already.* Ezra *owns* a fake ID.” It’s the fourth time that Hera’s repeated the statement in the past five minutes. Which Kanan figures means one of two things. Either she’s currently futilely hoping one of these times his answer will change or she’s processing through what that information actually means in the its greater scope, and she’s not much liking the resultant implications.

Whether either that or # 3 - the news has just fried out her processing centers completely for the moment.

Kanan’s not guessing that the first is actually the culprit - Hera tends to accept news that disturbs her even if she doesn’t like it fairly quickly. Probably because she’s too much of a pragmatist to devote much time to denial when she can be focused on literally fixing here and now sorts of problems instead. The latter is most likely, and Kanan’s latest bit of news? Well its a hard pill to swallow no matter how hard he works to cushion it first. Which is why he’s opting to just approach things directly and frankly.

“Ezra bought a Fake ID?” Hera repeats the sentence one final time, then licks her lips and shakes her head a little as to knock loose her thoughts.

“No.” Kanan corrects her then, because there is a clear delineation of difference. “Ezra was *gifted* fake ID, Hera. Which he revealed to me when I brought up our potential worries about lack of paperwork for him that we could use at a clinic while on Alderaan. And now I’m bringing it to you because you’re a better judge of its quality these days than I am.”

Kanan holds out the neatly leather enfolded bundle, noting the slight micro tremor in Hera’s hands as she first pauses and then eventually takes it. “How on Yavin did he…?”

“Hondo.” Kanan interrupts the question bluntly.

“Hondo?!” Hera sounds somewhere between bewildered and genuinely astonished. “Why on earth would Hondo want to…?!”

“Probably as part of his ongoing recruitment strategy with Era, Hera.”

Hera blinks at that, “Wait. You mean that he’s *still*…?”

“Yup. Well according to Zeb and Sabine at least. They heard him and Ezra talking at the end of their previous ‘field trip.’ Not that Ezra’s apparently considering taking any of said offers seriously. That he’ll admit to anyway.” Kanan’s never had any credible concerns about that before…though now after some of he and his Padawan’s more recent conversations… He tries to brush the thought off for now with a quick shake of his own head.

“I won’t. I wouldn’t,” Had been the teenagers direct quote on the subject. Under normal circumstances, Kanan would simply have opted to believe him. But everyone – teenagers especially, and traumatized street rats even more than normal adolescents, could at times make out of character decisions when they were under enough pressure or stress. Given Ezra’s little mental slip in their last conversation, Kanan intends to watch the relationship between Ezra and Hondo more carefully than before, just to be on the safe side. Sith, maybe he’ll even try and arrange a little one on one ‘chat’ with Hondo to discuss the nature of Jedi training bonds and the potential results of becoming perceived as a threat by a Padawan’s master . It certainly wouldn’t hurt to make the pirate more… uhm…*aware* of Kanan’s personal commitments and the potential consequences of Hondo kriffing seriously with any of them. 

It’s not overprotective parenting, after all, Kanan reminds himself with a grim little smile, if your kid’s traumatized enough at the moment that he probably needs a little extra guard dogging.

“Little Gods Kanan, this thing is…” Hera whistles softly under her breath, opening the leather bundle in her hands, gingerly. “It’s at least…”

“Let me guess? Second tier quality?” He guesses.

“Top tier even, I’m guessing. This looks to be on the same level at minimum as your current ID, Kanan. And you’re claiming that Hondo just gave it to him…with no strings? For free?!”

“Half for a debt owed and half, or so Hondo claims, as a belated birthday present.”

“A debt? For what exactly?!” Hera chokes. “Did Ezra save his first born or something when we weren't looking? Kanan, do you have any idea what this thing must have cost these days?! As far as I can see it’s probably functionally perfect. Ezra would never have been able to get his hands on something like this on his own, I’ll tell you that much.”

“Not quite yet no, Hera. He doesn’t have the contacts yet to find someone with enough professional expertise.”

“Kanan, kriff that. I’m talking about the cost of this thing *financially*.”

Kanan bites his lip, thoughtful “Hera, no offense, but I think you may be underestimating Ezra’s commitment to building his savings over the past eighteen months or so. I don’t know a solid number of course for how much he’s actualy squirreled away, but I know Ezra’s been entering and wining the squadron and base wide Sabaac tournaments for months now, ever since that became a viable option for him. Plus he’s got a nice little scrounge, repair and sell thing going on the side during the quieter periods that’s fueled by things he salvages from the junk markets whenever we find the time to go off planet.” Kanan shrugs his shoulders, “He’s not a big spender, Hera, no, but he’s also definitely not hurting for money right now.”

“And this didn’t concern you enough to bring up before now?” He can hear Hera’s posture shift restlessly as she crosses her arms, “Kanan, you’re the one who indicated that he might currently be a flight risk.”

“Yeah but the savings thing’s been going on for months now, Hera. The concern about him leaving’s more recent. Basically just since…”

“Davin 7.” Hera says a little grimly.

Kanan nods. “Until after that point Hera, whenever I heard the gossip about the tournaments or heard the others teasing him about being a bit of a skin flint, I just thought he was enjoying the chance to finally build up a little personal savings. After the way he grew up it’s not unreasonable frankly speaking…” Not to mention, frugality in their lifestyle isn’t a negative trait, generally speaking. It can at time in fact be an outright necessity. Kanan’d seen no reason to discourage the habit in Ezra. It’s only now that he has to actually stop and wonder with a bit more concern where and how Ezra’s been accruing all that said personal funding. And why he’s been doing it in the first place as well.

Hera chews on all this information for a long couple of moments, her complete stillness the only audible sign of her distress. “How likely is he to try and take off right now, honestly? Do you even know, Kanan?”

Kanan considers he and Ezra’s most recent exchange. Recalls Ezra’s stunned, hoarse- voiced response to his frankly offered warning about Ezra bolting. As well as the Kid's refusal of the hug Kanan had offered him afterward, as well as Ezra's all too genuine eagerness at the suggestion of the morning’s later saber training.

“I think that we can assume that I’ve diffused that threat pretty thoroughly, Hera, at least for the time being. Ezra may hide occasionally right now if he starts feeling particularly emotionally vulnerable, but he’s not going to actually try and leave I don't think.”

“All right then.” Here sighs even more deeply still, reaching up to dig her hand into the taut muscle of her right clavicle. “Then on to addressing the more immediate problem. What in kark are we supposed to do *now* that we know that this thing exists, Kanan? How long exactly has he had it? And more importantly why does he think that he *needs* it?”

“Beyond the bluntly obvious reason that he lost any other kind of identifying paperwork he had as Dev Morgan while he undercover at the Academy Hera, and we never bother to replace it? Or even brought the subject up to him again?”

“Yeah but that was because we agreed that doing so - getting new ID I mean - probably wasn’t worth the resources it would have required with the kind of jobs we were doing at the time!”

“Yeah, well we never bothered to share that conclusion with Ezra, now did we Hera? Despite the fact that he was actually the one who had pulled out his papers from his time on Lothol before he met us so that we wouldn’t have to get new ones made up for the job. Morgan wasn’t our cover initially, Hera, it was Ezra's. Which means he didn’t see us as necessary to involve in securing a replacement. It wasn't *our* job to worry about it when the ID was lost.”

And that statement? Makes Hera curse softly in reply. Her hands tighten as she snaps the ID closed with a sharp click. “How long has he had the thing, *exactly* Kanan? Did he even say for certain?”

“Well over a year now,” Kanan chews on his own lower lip then shrugs his shoulders. “From what he said earlier, Hera, the ID was pretty much a ‘slightly belated’ 16th birthday gift. It was clearly also his favorite present of the bunch.”

“Of course it was his favorite!” Hera scoffs, more than a little bit grimly. “What teenager in their right mind doesn’t want the kind of freedom that this thing actually represents, Kanan? The access its given Ezra to purchasing…well almost anything that he wants to buy when we’re not around to actively try and stop him.”

“He hasn’t been abusing it that way, Hera.” Kanan interjects very calmly in response. 

“You sound pretty sure of that.” Hera scoffs at the idea, clearly disbelieving.

Kanan shrugs a little, rubbing a hand down over the front of his face before continuing. “He was very blunt when he talked about how and where he’s been using it thus far, and with the bond wide open like it was I’d have known if he was lying, Hera. He outright stated to my face that he hasn’t used it for the normal trifecta of teenage banthashit. No booze, no drugs, no porn – nothing like that “ He snorts, “Force Hera, I almost wish he'd told me otherwise…” It'd be one less thing he has to now actively worry about.

Because seriously, Kanan’d kill for a set of ‘normal’ teenage’ issues like drinking or sneaking out to meet a date at the moment. But no, instead he's got Childhood Abandonment and Recruiting Space Pirates and a personal sexual background so kriffing traumatic that Ezra’s really not even looking at the concept of real romantic relationships as something that's feasible for him at the moment. (Which is probably, Kanan admits, is probably a wise if also very sad thing.)

“Then why bother with getting it at all, Kanan? Why bother to actually procure said ID? What other reasons could Ezra want one right now that are half as compelling when he's got no need for said ID to procure daily necessities or transport or weapons?”

Kanan steels himself for the next words. Because Hera is *not* going to like this next bit. “From what I can tell, Ezra apparently just likes knowing that he now has guaranteed access to non black market medical supplies and treatment if he happens to need them, Hera. For him, I think the thing is basically the equivalent of an emotional security blanket.”

Hera growls at that, suddenly furious by the sound of her voice. “And when the Kark has that boy needed medical care since he first came aboard the Ghost that we *didn’t* both know about and then and deal with it immediately, Kanan?! He doesn’t *need* a fake ID for that… no matter what he apparently thinks!”

Kanan sighs, “I think you’re missing the point here, Hera…probably almost completely."

“And what *is* said point exactly?” He can hear the scowl in Hera's voice.

“Look…that thing isn’t about what we have or we haven’t provided him up until now, Hera, it’s more about him feeling like he’s no longer going to be vulnerable like he was before. Like even if something happens he won't ever be left completely helpless and resourceless the way that he suddenly was back at age seven. Like he can…” Kanan runs an agitated hand back through his hair, “like he can just be reassured that he’ll always have what he needs to be safe no matter what his current life situation.”

And just like that, Hera’s up and out of the gate again, her whole body tense, her temper rising right along with her accent. “And how in Kark is him needing and ID for *that* that not the worst possible proof of failure on our parts that you've ever heard of Kanan?! Because unless I'm understand parenthood completely wrong Love, we were the ones who were supposed to *be* that kriffing reassurance!”

“It’s just *perceived* power on Ezra's part, Hera.” Kanan says bluntly, sighing again, and trying to keep his own voice gentle. “It's the notion of control over his life and environment. The Kid just wants to know he'll be able to take care of himself if something bad comes up from behind that he can't see right away… He wants to feel safe, and the ID is his reassurance that he can.”

“He shouldn’t *have to* shoulder that job with the two of us around anymore, Kanan!” Hera literally throws the ID in her hand so great is her frustration. “I mean in case you missed the memo Kanan, he’s *not* actually an adult yet - he’s just barely turned 17! Keeping him safe and making sure he has what he needs is is supposed to be our job, not his! ” Hera’s leaning in toward him now, “Not to even mention, if you haven’t already noticed this already Kanan, that he’s pretty much failed at taking care of himself epically up until this point! You said yourself that his mind is in tatters – he can’t even handle being told he has to go to a doctor’s apartment without bolting for the bathroom to vomit. That is not the kind of behavior you’d expect to find in someone *ready* to be out on his own again!”

“And you think I don’t know that, Hera?” Kanan tells, her, his voice a little bit cold. “I know that probably better than anyone! Or have you just failed to notice the several dozen times since our return from Davin 7 that I’ve mentioned that I’m directly tied into his mind, remember? I know more than anyone else on the whole damn planet about Ezra's mental status at the moment, and I never once claimed he is ready to be completely independent.”

“Then why in the kriff *aren’t* we just spacing that damned thing, Kanan?!” Hera points to where the ID lays, presumably still on the floor. “I mean what was the point of us bringing him aboard the Ghost all those years ago if nothing was actually going to *change* Love. If we’re just going to leave him to twist in the wind while we watch him strangle himself to death slowly? Why the kriff is Ezra even *here* Kanan, if we’re not going to at least try and be what he can't be at this point in his life?!”

“I never said that we weren’t going to, Hera.” Kanan snaps back, “And once again you’re completely missing the point! The thing is his emotional security blanket, remember, not his life strategy or his middle finger to either of us! Let me spin a little analogy for you, Hera and then maybe you’ll get the picture a little bit more clearly. This has everything to do with Ezra and almost nothing to do with you or me! You don’t take away a scared, abandoned kid’s stuffed loth cat, all right?Wwhen he finally lets you hold it after months of refusing to let you do so just because you’re pissed off that he’s been hugging it all that time instead of you! You ask him the name of the damn thing! You help him clean it up if it got dirty in the interim. And when you do finally get to cuddle with him for awhile after all that work is done, because he's grateful for the way that you've protected something he values and he's finally starting to trust you as a result? Well then you start by making enough room in that embrace for all *three* of you. You build trust until you're the one he reaches out toward intially.”

Silence descends. “Kanan,” Hera’s voice is a little too patient, a little too condescending. “Ezra’s not a baby. That ID is not a cat. He’s going to be eighteen in just a little over nine months now.”

“Yes. And he’s been an orphan full time since he was seven years old, Hera. That’s ten years for the most part that he was all but completely alone. It isn’t that big of a difference, Hera- at least not for him. I don’t care how smart or powerful Ezra is, okay? We we both know damn well that neglect still slows the general acquisition of both social and emotional maturity. We…look we’re going to have to ease him into the reality of having competent guardians again, Hera… And we’re going to have to do so gently, or he’s going to panic or worse yet think that we don't trust him anymore after what he finally told us. And that's especially true right now in particular considering his previous issues with neglect, abuse and abandonment."

“So what?" Hera scowls. "You’re saying we that haven’t been doing that already literally ever since we first met him?”*

“No, we haven't, Hera- at least not what he's registered as explicitly. We’ve been doing Quid Quo Pro, okay? Ezra came on board initially because I offered to teach him about the Force, and because you made it clear that wanted him on board as a crewmate. Those are both distinct roles, and yes they each have their own specific privileges and duties, but Master and Captain are not synonymous in Ezra's personal lexicon for ‘parent’, okay? He’s going to need someone to spell it all out for him, Hera – quite possibly explicitly. Like I – like both of us should have probably done outright from the very beginning. But I kriffed up. Because I was sacred to death myself and because hindsight as they say is always 20/20.” 

Kanan exhales, slowly. “In the meantime, Hera, if we’re dealing with some role confusion right now - which for the record yes, we most definitely are - and it’s led to Ezra feeling like he needs a fake ID to truly feel safe?” Kanan shrugs, “Then that’s on us every bit as much as it’s on him, Hera. Maybe even more so really, because after all we were the ones who never bothered to clarify things with him, even though *we’re* supposedly the adults in the situation. Ezra’s just being the exact same childhood trauma survivor that he’s always been, and its not fair for us to punish him for it.”

“Why, Kanan? Because you’re afraid he might get mad at us for stealing his faux sense of safety and replacing it with something realer instead?” Hera snorts. “Newsflash! Teenagers are always mad at their parents and their environments, Kanan! We both were constantly angry at Ezra’s age too, and guess what - we both somehow lived through it intact. As far as 'security blankets' go a stuffed animal is a lot less dangerous potentially speaking than that ID and the things that Ezra could accomplish right now with it in his hand.”

“No. We’re not going to destroy his ID, Hera, because Ezra as much as told me outright when he gave it to me a few minutes ago that he’d see any serious attempt to take it away from him at this point as an outright betrayal! And frankly Hera? At this point in the situation, I’d have to agree with him! What Ezra does with that thing is *not* just our call anymore, Hera! not when he’s less than a year from his actual age of majority and when neither of us could afford to replace it easily when he finally does come of age if it were destroyed before that. Also, not when we send him into battle semi-regularly for the sake of our and other people’s lives, Hera. We don’t get to treat Ezra like he's an adult - to shove a weapon in his hand in combat situations and then call him a child everywhere else but there because it’s more emotionally convenient for either of us. Not unless, of course, we really are total hypocrites about it!”

He stands from the chair, makes his way over to where he heard the item fall, feels around with his foot for a moment until he locates the rectangle of leather and scoops it up, making sure it’s neatly folded with his fingers before shoving it deep into his own left pants pocket. “No, Ezra having a fake ID is not 'ideal' for any of us in a lot of ways right now, Hera, but I am not punishing him for his karking honesty and trust in telling me he actually has it." Kanan grimaces then and drops back down into his seat. "I’m especially not going to do so when he only revealed that the Force damned thing existed to me in the first place as *proof* that he’s willing to submit to a physical he's terrified of but you still demanded. Your little round of emotional blackmail from last night has already had enough emotional fall out as it is.” 

“Emotional Blackmail, Kanan?!” Hera’s voice is a full on hiss, but Kanan finds he’s unable to back down, even in the face of her rising anger “And what the kark is that supposed to mean!?”

Kanan leans forward in his own chair, fully baring his own teeth in frustration before continuing. “At least have the courage to call a Bantha a Bantha, 'Captain Syndulla.' You all but implied the other night at dinner that if Ezra doesn’t submit to this doctor’s appointment like the rest of us are supposed to do then you’re probably going to retaliate by letting them ground him from flying. And this is Ezra, Hera. What did you think he was going to do under those terms but do whatever it takes to protect those he cares about, no matter the personal cost? It was emotional blackmail, Hera, the way you ambushed him and strong armed him with this kind of choice – and both of us straight up already know it.”

“I just want to know that he’s physically healthy, Kanan! That he’s going to be all right!" Hera explodes once again in sheer frustration "Stop making it sound so unreasonable for me to want a medical professional to assess the situation and reassure us that Ezra’s…that he is going to be fine kark it...!”

Kanan literally shouts the next words at full volume. “He’s a survivor of multiple sexual assaults in childhood, Hera! Of *course* he isn’t kriffing just going to be ‘fine’ or anything anywhere near it!” 

Hera flinches. Kanan sighs but pushes ahead, because like it or not this has to be said. “Ezra isn’t ‘fine’ - he hasn't been 'fine' since the day that we first met him, Hera and he isn’t going to be 'fine' for a very, very long time yet to come. Not even with every bit of support we can drudge up to help him start to mend in the interim. You’re setting yourself up for a massive fall if you honestly expect anyone else to tell you anything different. Ezra is severely traumatized: he needs time to heal – to open up and finally start to deal with everything he experienced, just like every other rape survivor does as part of the healing process. But he'll only ever start that process in if he also knows he's safe and he can trust us, and that is not going to happen, Hera. I mean it, *it won't* if you stay so intent on parenting straight out of the Fundamentalist University of Cham…”

Utter silence, shocked and icy, immediately follows that sentence. Kanan groans, and drops his head for a moment. “Look I’m sorry, Hera.” Because that was harsh. "I should have said that differently."

“No you’re not sorry.” Hera snaps back at him. "About the message at least you're not."

Ando he isn’t. He isn’t sorry for what he said - just the way it came out, and that he didn't phrase it better. He draws in another deep, shaky breath and reminds himself this isn't just about him and her - that they are only part of this equation and a small part at that. What's more important right now is how they can help Ezra. “Just…stop it Hera, okay? Stop making dictates from on high like you're some kind of omniscient benevolent God. It’s not accomplishing anything constructive when you try to play one and the costs of cleaning up the mess that results are steadily becoming more and more crippling for the rest of us, okay?”

“Costs?” Hera’s next words are no less tense but at least now she’s a little more quiet. Like maybe for the first time since this conversation started Hera’s finally hearing just what he’s saying in fact and not just judging his words in preparation for her eventual reply.

“Yes, Hera - the costs. Like Ezra finally consenting to submit to a physical that will give us almost none of the information that you were actually seeking– and will almost inevitably end with him retraumatized, panicked or puking anyway. Costs like my having to warn Ezra earlier this morning that yes, if he tries to run at this point then I will chase his butt down across the karking universe if needed… Because I am in fact the Kid’s Guardian Ad Litum and that's what a parent kriffing *does.* Never mind that that's literally the last way in the literal Universe Hera, that I wanted to introduce Ezra to the idea that yes, he has an actual parent and not just a Master again.”

Kanan gains his feet one more time then, turns toward the cockpit door and makes his way out into the hallway, stopping with just one more softly spoken sentence before the door swings shut softly open in front him. “As I said earlier, Hera. *Before* you dictate to Ezra about any of this right now, you talk to me first okay? Because our usual ‘improvisational' strategy of hit and run child rearing where Ezra is concerned? Is currently bleeding both me and Ezra to death. And we just can't afford any more of that kind of loss at present.”

The door closes behind him then, without another sound, and Kanan leans against the wall for a moment, well aware that his whole body is shaking with both repressed anger and adrenaline.

‘And that,’ he acknowledges with a wry little smile, ‘Had been distinctly *anything* but fun.’

xx000xxx000xxx000

 

Two days later, Ezra drops himself down onto a crate in the Ghost’s largest cargo bay, his, breath still labored from their last round of sparring. His posture is exhausted and his face is bright red as he tries to catch his breath. “Okay – since I’m clearly paying for it in bruises today, what in Kriff is going on with you and Hera, Kanan?! Who started the fight, who needs to send the karking flowers, and while we're on the subject, when if ever are we actually leaving for the capital of Alderaan?”

“Thursday noon, Ezra. And the rest is nothing that you need to concern yourself with, Kid.”

Ezra snorts openly at that statement. “It’s been almost thirty hours since you two’ve even voluntarily been in the same room together, Kanan. Forgive a guy for worrying, okay? This isn’t your norm or even your outlier.” Though Ezra’s tone is light, his eyes are shadowed and anxious as he speaks – his message simultaneously clear and unspoken. ‘Please tell me, Master, that I'm not responsible for this.’

Kanan sighs deeply and runs a hand across his forehead, “Not everything that gets bruised or broken in the world is your fault, Kid. Sometimes couples just fight, all right.” He’s not even particularly lying. Yes, Ezra’s technically the cause of he and Hera’s ongoing argument. Still ‘cause of’ and ‘responsible for’ aren’t the same thing in this particular context. Not that the teenager’s current bull dog of a worry complex is necessarily going to easily accept the distinction at present.

“If you say so.” Ezra turns his focus to picking at the fabric covering his left knee cap. Kanan frowns at the nervous gesture and nudges him with an elbow.

“We’ll be fine, Kid. I promise. Even healthy relationships experience a blow up occasionally. That's actually normal. Don't worry so much about it.”

Ezra's voice is wry and a little bit resigned, “Yeah, well being around Hera’s kind of like standing on a slowly bulging volcano dome at the moment, Kanan. Forgive me for remembering that I’m rather flammable at present and prefer to keep well away from the blow back.”

Kanan smirks despite himself – because as dramatic as it is, he can’t even entirely dispute the analogy. “She’s not mad at *you,* right now, Ezra. You’ll be fine, just give her plenty of space forawhile.”

Ezra snorts “Like Kriff she isn’t mad at me. This was all started by the ID that I admitted to having wasn’t it?”

Kanan shrugs noncommittally, “I did warn you that she wouldn’t be happy about it when she found out, Ezra.”

“Yeah well indignant or disappointed were to be expected, yes Kanan. I wasn’t anticipating she'd end up this outright livid. Women are *weird* sometimes, Master! Their hierarchies of the unacceptable confuse the kriff out of me.” Ezra admits then with a small wry smile and a scratch to the top of his head.

Kanan smiles a little at that, “The livid’s not yours to take the blame for Ezra: it’s mine. The ID didn't cause the real fight, just catalyzed some further needed discussion. And even the fight we that we did have while not fun was still necessary. And just for the record, I’m actually glad that you fessed up when you did about the paperwork, Ezra…because getting new stuff made would have been both expensive and taken ages longer, truthfully.”

Ezra shrugs, “It needed to be done. Better to just get things over with anyway. I can’t exactly say that I’m looking forward to having to visit the clinic, but I also don’t see the point in unnecessarily prolonging the agony. Kark or get off the pot I think is the most pertinent current analogy.”

Kanan considers that particular bit of wisdom for a moment, and then decides to follow his Padawan’s own sage advice, albeit in this case in an attempt to provide some useful distraction. “I’ve got a question for you, Ezra…”

“That being?” Ezra’s voice is in that perfect middle ground between curious and suspicious.

“When was the last time that you had a hands on, no holds barred full on medical checkup? Not triage, Ezra – just a general wellness check up on pretty much everything, I mean. Am I wrong to assume that it was sometime before the death of your parents?”

Ezra shakes his head with a small shrug. “It was just before my 7th birthday actually.”

Kanan considers this too for a moment, picking his next phrasing carefully. “And would you be willing to barter on the possibility of having another on Alderaan, Ezra? If the offer on the table in exchange was sufficient?”

“Kanan…” Ezra stiffens a bit at the words, but Kanan continues on gently but relentlessly.

“I’m *asking,* Kid, not demanding for the record. I’m just…I’m worried about you okay? That’s a long time to go without proper medical care for anyone under any circumstances. And it seems kind of stupid to…I don’t know, basically half ass it if you are getting checked over, if you know what I mean?”

Ezra actually barks out a small laugh. “I hadn’t really thought of it quite that way.” He admits with a soft sigh, "but you're probably right in that context."

“Like I already said…it’s a suggestion, Ezra, not any kind of order. It's your body and your choice after all, unless you're mentally or physically incapacitated and/or there's an immediate life threatening health crisis. It’s just… I guess I understand the value of what I'm asking you do from your perspective? Which is why I’m offering to bargain in exchange for your agreement, Ezra. You do this for my peace of mind Ezra and I’ll seriously consider nearly any reasonable kind of reciprocation in return.”

“I want to go home.” Ezra replies very softly.

Kanan chokes on the words, alarmed in reaction.

“No… No not like that.” Ezra hurriedly clarifies, pounding on his Master's back. “I just mean that want to go back to Lothol for vacation, Kanan. Sometime nowhere near Empire day preferably. And for an actual social visit I mean, Kanan - not just as a quick flyby between places or when we need to drop in in roder to help with the latest rebellion related crisis. I want to watch a sunset, and a sunrise, Master. I want to walk out toward the tower again through the grass.”

Kanan chews his lip as he processes this. “I take it that you’re feeling pretty homesick lately?”

“A little bit, I guess. It's more that...look I get that my parent’s house is basically nothing but rubble now, Kanan, I really do. Still we never really got a chance to go back one last time and scavenge. I know it’s mostly just junk anyway there now anyway but I still…” Ezra shrugs helplessly.

Kanan puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes. “You don’t have to explain anymore than that Ezra. I’m pretty sure I understand.” Sometimes the need for mementos from one's loved ones – even small ones, in times of emotional stress can be a very powerful thing.

“For that…for the chance at a couple days at home I’d be willing to…” Ezra's voice cracks then a little. “I’m pretty sure in exchange for that that I could push myself through the kind of examination you're talking about. Like I said before it won’t be like last time was anyway…” The teenager swallows hard. “It’s probably stupid, really, to keep getting this freaked out about it anyway.”

Kanan’s hand squeezes on his shoulder more tightly this time. He scans the area around them for a moment longer, grateful for their current complete lack audience before speaking up again. “Hey - you’re allowed to have issues with being naked in front of people or being touched by strangers after what happened to you, Ezra. It’s normal to have that kind of reaction…” Or at least it is as far as his research on the subject has informed Kanan anyway.

“It’s *not* that exactly.” Ezra grumbles

“Then maybe you help me understand.” Kanan keeps his own tone open and patient. And Ezra's mouth opens and closes several time in apparent attempt at a real explanation.

Until, finally: “Ah Kark it, Bridger. Just kriffing grow up about it already!” Once again the words all but erupt out of Ezra's own lips - and seem to be aimed more at himself than the world at large as Ezra suddenly shifts in his seat, and Kanan hears fabric being tugged outward with a harsh set of breaths, and then there's the sound of a gear harness being unbuckled and gently laid to one side. 

Then Ezra’s hand is reaching out to grab Kanan's free hand with his own. “I want, I *need* to show you something, Kanan.”

“Ezra you don’t have to…” Kanan stumbles a little on his next words, uncertain what exactly he’s about to be facing. "You don't owe me..."

“*Yes I karking do.* Not to mention that it’s the only Forced damned way I’m ever going to really get past this.” And then Kanan’s hand is being pushed firmly against warm skin; up underneath Ezra shirt just below what Kanan’s guessing is the center of his stomach. The unexpected contact is enough to make the older Jedi blink hard for a couple of seconds. The initial feel of a belly button is unmistakable and a little distracting at first, but it only takes Kanan a moment longer after that to truly process the rest of what he’s feeling – the multiple criss crossing scars that he can feel scrawled across Ezra’s lower abdomen. Like someone has used something sharp to karking *carve* words across the surface of his skin.

Ezra meanwhile, is now practically babbling - trying to get the words out of his mouth as fast as he possibly can. “Like I said it’s *stupid* Kanan. The guy who... who grabbed me... the year that I turned thirteen. He also liked cutting as well as... as hurting and killing his victims when he finally finished with them. Though the marks I ended up weren't lethal, he just…” Ezra let his own hand raise to cover an involuntary gagging sound, “He karking marked me up like I was just a kriffing piece of meat, Kanan. And that shouldn’t matter. It *doesn’t* matter! I mean I’m alive for Force Sakes Master, and everyone else he got ahold of died, so really I was probably lucky, but I just can't stand the thought of strangers looking and seeing...”

Kanan rapidly shifts his hand out from under the fabric to tug Ezra into a fierce hug – one arm around Ezra’s waist, the other protecting the vulnerable back of his head almost instinctively. “It matters, Kid! It’s allowed to matter, okay? It's allowed to hurt!” 

And for some reason that's finally enough. With that bit of permission Kanan feels something bend and then break in his Padawan's mind, and thedfor the first time since that night on Davin 7 Ezra Bridger weeps. Silently yes, but hard enough his knees go out, leaving Kanan to keep them both upright for the moment as the sobs literally wrack his body.

When Ezra finally speaks again minutes later, his voice is hoarse, full of tears he’s fighting to keep from falling any longer. “I ...I *know* that I need to get a check up, Kanan. I do. I logically understand where you and Hera are coming from with all of this. But honestly without getting absolutely trashed first so I can stay numb, so I don't have to think about anything? I have no clue at all how I’m going to manage to endure any of it.”

“Then *don’t*.” The words are out before Kanan can stop them. And Force but Hera’s going to murder him for this. Literally. He just doesn’t *care* anymore - not as he brings up both of his hands to gently shake Ezra’s shoulders in order to emphasize his next point. "You are allowed to have limits, Ezra and to acknowledge them. Don't you dare let anyone tell you different!"

“But the fleet…”

“Can do without you, Ezra! Or show some karking empathy for your actual situation. You are not a cog in a machine, okay? You are a person! And given how many times we’ve helped save all their asses in recent years, Rebel command can Force-Damned bend their own rules occasionally.” Kanan draws in a breath, growing angrier with every passing word. “And if they won’t, then there are other ways that you can help other people that will have far less personal cost, Kid. Don’t set yourself on fire trying to be other people’s light Ezra! That kind of kriff never works in the long term for anyone.”

Ezra blinks at those words a moment, and then wipes at his eyes with his sleeves. "But you and Hera both said that I need to…you've both been so...”

“Worried. Yes, we have been. We've been stressed out over the possibility that there’s more damage that we missed, Ezra. And guess what we were right –“ He gestures at the teenager's middle. “But you’re still here, Ezra – still alive and still breathing despite that, absolutely miraculously! And it is *not* your job to be comforting *us* right now Kid, no matter what you think. It’s your job to be honest about how you feel and know your limits as we try and help you. If we’re really going to be compromising on the big stuff Ezra, then that means at the end of the day everybody - including you - has to win.”

“…I can handle blood work just fine, Kanan. If it helps to know that.” Ezra provides after a long moment of silence. “And probably a fair number of scans as well if... if nobody stands there the whole time and gawks at me while they're being done.” He pauses, “I mean what else is really necessary, given how long ago it all happened, anyway? It's not like we're talking about something that occurred last week or anything.”

Kanan pauses a moment. “Does anything *hurt* - in places it regularly shouldn’t, Ezra? Do you ever have problems with using the restroom and then bleeding a lot afterward?”

“No.”

“How about infections that just seem to keep coming back over and over anywhere?”

Ezra shakes his head, “No not that I’ve ever noticed physically or on previous bloodwork that isn’t tied to other stuff like pre-existing allergies causing sinus infections or stuff like that.”

“Well then let me talk with one of the medics just to be sure I'm not over looking anything…but honestly Ezra I can’t imagine why that shouldn’t be sufficient for now for diagnostic purposes. Not unless something different were to show up in the bloodwork or scans. We can probably limit you to a trip to medical imaging and then over to the laboratory for a few blood samples.”

“And if you're wrong about that or if Hera hears and flips her lid when she finds out about the change?”

Kanan’s grin is grim but determined. “You leave dealing with Hera to me, Ezra, I already told you that that's *not* your responsibility right now to manage.”

“And what?!” Ezra asks, his laugh a little wry and a little bit grim, “I go from living on a bulging volcanic dome to standing in the middle of a crater in the meantime if she responds as badly as it looks like she's going to, Kanan? I don’t want to be the one who yanks the cork outta that particular bottle , all right? It's bad enough that she's already as mad as she is!”

“Again that is not your problem right now, Kid – you handle knowing and acknowledging your own limits Ezra, and I handle any necessary clean up with Hera that results.”  


“While I what, Kanan?! Go hide on the other side of base for a few days and do inventory or something with Rex?!”

Kanan wrinkles his nose at that. “…Hiding’s such a coarse word, Ezra. I much prefer the use of retreat.”

Ezra snorts. “Hey you’re the one always promoting personal honesty, Kanan.”

“Jedi do not ‘hide’, Ezra Bridger,” Kanan informs him archly then, before putting the next set of words in air quotes, “We merely perform tactical withdrawals to more defensible locations.”

And *that?* Is apparently all that it takes to reduce the boy to helpless laughter, which right now Kanan is going to take as good thing. Ezra’s got enough weight on his shoulders right now after all, to make Star Destroyer burn out from the sheer load of over stressing. “It’s going to be all right, Ezra really I promise it will be...” He reassures the boy again, gently nudging him with one of his elbows once the younger man finally starts to calm down, the younger man resting on the box after laughing so hard that tears had literally streamed down yet again across his cheeks. “I know this knowledge may shock you given how calm we’ve become in our hypothetical ‘dotage’ Ezra, but back in the old days, Hera and I actually used to snarl at each other on a semi regular basis. Kriff most of the time, it was even kind of fun.”

“Really?” Ezra stares dropped jawed at his Master after that announcement. “Why on Lothol would anyone want to fight if they can possibly avoid it?”

“There are certain…advantages, Ezra, to making up after a period of scuffling.”

“Kanan!” Ezra practically whines then, his hands going up to his ears, instinctively. “There are things that I do not need to know about you guys! That will now probably be stuck in my head *indefinitely.*”

Kanan smirks in reply. Because honestly right now he can’t not - it's a huge relief to have any kind of positive emotional outlet. “Well, what can I say, Kid? I have very few real pleasures in my life anymore. I'll take what I can, where and when I can.”

“You are a horrible, horrible person, Kanan!” Ezra moans in reply into his hands.

The older Jedi's smirk only grows. “I’ll admit it’s a hobby.” he acknowledges generously.

“You guys just…really didn’t talk at all for days before? Really?!” Ezra valiantly tries to change the subject and Kanan decides to be merciful and let him.

“All the time, Ezra, especially after the first year or so together. When the initial newness of our relationship first wore off right along with the shiny and all those charming personal quirks really began to get annoying. We’d blow up and then stomp around for days afterward in silence. If truth, we used to drive Chopper *batty.*”

Ezra snorts softly, “I’m sorry Kanan, but I just can’t picture that. I mean you two have just always seemed so steady.”

“Yeah well that’s the nature of the beast, Ezra. It’s called a long-term relationship. You know, the kind in which the good stuff from a bunch of years worth of shared sacrifice usually beats out the occasional moments of awfulness or annoyance that can occur week to week.” Kanan tilts his head a little. “I know you were young, but did your parents really never fight much when you were little? At least where you could see it I mean?”

“Not generally, no, Kanan. But then that was probably because my mom could get…er…rather salty, when she got mad.” Ezra acknowledges a little sheepishly after a moment.

Kanan arches an eyebrow in response. “Really now?” Well - you learned something new every day. And here Kanan had always assumed Ezra has acquired most of his verbal blue streak as a result of all his years on the street.

Ezra snorts, “She may have also had the occasional habit of chucking things right at my Dad’s head. But that was mostly only pillows as faras I recall. And to be honest from what I remember my Dad probably mostly deserved it. They were good people, but especially when off the air, my dad could get really, really sarcastic truthfully.”

“Ah…then you got that trait straight out of the deep end of the gene pool then and not just randomly?” He smirks at his apprentice. In truth Kanan’s actually rather impressed by the sudden pivot in topic. He thinks this is probably the most personal information about Mira and Ephraim Bridger that he’s ever gotten out of his Padawan ever - at least in casual conversation.

“I am not *that* sarcastic, Kanan.” Ezra objects.

Kanan merely raises an eyebrow at him.

Ezra’s hands go to his hips. "Well, I’m not! I just happen to... excel at verbal misdirection when I see the immediate need for it.“

Kanan chuffs in response to that claim. “I suppose that we should call it progress that you’re at least admitting to that much, Ezra.” He replies a little dryly.

Ezra just responds by spreading his arms, the closer bumping into Kanan gently, “Hey what can I say, Master? We all gotta use what talents we can.”

Kanan pokes him gently with a finger in half amused rebuke, “Yeah well, just be careful playing that game too often, huh kid? Any skilled dueller knows after all, Ezra, that a double blade can easily cut in both directions.”

“Yeah but we both have *lightsabers,* Kanan. So it’s not exactly a problem. They cauterize.”

“Ezra…” Kanan sighs, reaching up to rub the bridge of his nose.

His Padawan cuts him off with a small wave. “Blah Blah. Whine. Moan. Yeah, yeah I get it Kanan. I do hear you, Master.”

Kanan responds to the cheeky retort with a single sharp cuff to his Padawan’s right ear, and then he drops his hand to Ezra’s shoulder and squeezes it gently. “I’m proud of you lately, Ezra. You do know that right?”

Ezra groans aloud, clearly aggrieved. “Oh Force, is this about to descend into repeated cuddling again, Kanan?”

Kanan's responding grin is all teeth, "If you keep running your *lip* than yes, it probably is.”

Ezra shudders theatrically. “Duly noted. I'll stop, Master.”

Kanan snorts and drops his hand, “I know, I know, Kid. Fates worse than death.”

“Were all the Jedi at the Temple this karking snuggly?” Kanan blinks as Ezra’s voice suddenly accuses him.

Kanan snorts aloud. "That would be a resounding no, Ezra. You can blame Hera and the others on The Ghost if that particular trait happens to be rubbing off on me.“

Ezra scoffs. “No...I call banthashit there, Kanan. I mean you’re waaaaay more touchy than I’ve ever seen any of the others be on even a semi-regular basis. No…no this is some kind of deep, shameful secret of the Jedi culture specifically. Which I have now apparently unearthed and can now use for blackmail purposes probably.”

Kanan again reaches out one more time and flicks his Padawan's forehead gently, “Ezra, I strongly suggest that you would falter quickly in a ‘who’s got more embarrassing stories on whom’ sort of contest. Engage in your battles more carefully, Kid, if you know what's good for you. Just because I don’t often enter that particular fray does not mean that I like to *lose* or that I’m unwilling when it's needed to fight kriffing dirty.”

”…A wise insight, Master.“ Ezra concedes, a moment later almost meekly.

Kanan smirks in reply to the point granted. "I’m glad to see that you’re finally coming around to seeing things my way.”

Ezra snorts at that, but any further verbal retort that he might have let loose with afterward, abruptly cuts off as the sound of multiple footsteps approach the ramp. "Hey, Rex! And oh…hey, Hera….you got back today early!“ There's a little too much cheer in the teenager's sentence for the emotion to be real Kanan knows.

The clone trooper’s low chuckle echoes through the docking bay nonetheless. "Ezra…good morning to you as well Kanan. I came to see if a bribe of lunch on me at the market might get you to join me for the rest of the day to help with some new inventory over in the docking bay. We just got a new shipment of spare parts from Dantooine that I’d love some help sorting through.”

Ezra shifts his body toward his Master, “Kanan?” He simply asks without further extrapolation.

“Not an issue from my view, Ezra. We already finished sparring for the day anyway, and you’ve already done your daily meditation.”

"Hera?” Ezra continues.

“Go ahead. I have a couple of things to set right around here but Kanan and I can deal with that on our own.” The pilot’s voice is still distinctly cool when she speaks. Not harsh per say but definitely still a clear level of distance.

Ezra swallows hard in reply, “All right then. If you’re sure that you’re not going to need me...”

Hera’s body shifts at that, and the chill in her tone thaws slightly. Kanan just wishes in that moment that he could see both of their facial expressions - and catch more of the nonverbal subtleties. “I’m sure.” Hera concedes, then still more gently, as she reaches out to squeeze Ezra's arm in her hand, “Are you going to be coming back here to sleep tonight, Ezra or are you going to be going back to the Phoenix dorms?“

"Am I supposed to be coming back here for some reason?”

“It’d be my preference, yes. But it’s your call as long as you’re here on time in the morning. I know it’s been a few days since you’ve really been able to visit with your friends and you are an adult now, well mostly at least.”

Kanan barely holds back the whole body exhale or relief. ‘Oh thank the *heavens.* No matter what else can be said about the last couple of days, he had left a lasting impression. 'She karking heard me.’

Ezra nods again. “Then yeah, I’ll be back later tonight. After I’m done helping Rex I mean.” Then Ezra’s being towed down the ramp, without further comment to or from anyone there, well short of Rex’s quick call of farewell to Kanan as they finally leave.

Kanan waits until they’re alone to speak, linking his arms together behind his back. “Hera,” he acknowledges simply. 

“Kanan,” she responds.

“Thanks… for what you just said to Ezra.” He says completely genuinely.

That seems to soften her up a little. She raises a hand to scratch at the base of one of her lek. “Yeah. No worries.”

He lets his arms fall to his side, more passive. “So - are you ready to do this then? Or can I go take a shower first before you really lay into me?”

There's more silence for a moment, and then a soft sigh from Hera. “Go – get yourself cleaned up. We have a while, and truthfully I need a meal, something for this headache and probably a short nap before we start talking about anything.”

All right then. He nods. “You know where you can usually find me Hera, whenever you decide that you’re ready to talk.”

“Are you going to be in the meditation room or galley, more likely later on today?”

“Depends on the time, really. I promised Ezra that I’d make some Wa’suki tonight during training. It’s always best to let it simmer as you know but you also have to keep close and stir it often in order to keep the bottom from scorching.”

Hera’s stomach rumbles at that. They both smile at the sound almost involuntarily. “Sounds good.” She concedes, after another moment or so. “By the way, Zeb and Sabine are both going to be gone at least until tomorrow morning as far as I know. Sabine said something about them all going stargazing overnight to see if they can spot any meteor shower through a good spot in the canopy...”

“Well then we’ve definitely got plenty of time. Because I guarantee Ezra won’t be coming back before sunset if he can help it.”

Hera tilts her head to the side, Lek thumping softly as she does so. "Uhm, Kanan - Rex said that it wasn’t all that big of a shipment. They'll run out of work eventually.“

"Yeah well, Ezra isn’t too hot right now with the idea of living on a bulging volcano slope, as he put it so charmingly to me earlier today.”

Hera snorts despite herself in response. “And was he referring to you there or me, Kanan, as the magma chamber in that particular analogy?”

Kanan smirks a little bit, tapping his forehead as if ceding a point, “Far be it for me to steal that title from a particularly deserving lady.”

Hera snorts yet again, this time as close as he’s heard her in two days to naturally. Then she pokes him in the chest sharply with one accusing finger. “I’m still pissed at you for the record, Kanan. Which means you don’t just get to kriffing smile like that and then charm me back into a good mood.”

He spread his hands to the side, as if in surrender, “Force forbid, Hera. As I said, when you’re actually ready to talk Hera, you know where you can come and find me.” And then he turns to make his way back to the ladder.

“Shameless flirt.” she snorts in reply even as he turns to go.

He smirks, “Grumpy hussy.” At least at this point, he figures, both names are actually being exchanged affectionately. Progress is progress no matter how small.

Kanan pauses one more time at the foot of the ladder, tilts his head to one side, “Would a backrub help at all with you headache, Hera?”

“Yeah probably.” The confession is soft.

“Do you want one?”

“…Maybe.”

Which is yes - at least in this particular circumstance anyway. Kanan nods and reaches for the first ladder rung, “Then just let me finish up my shower Hera, and then *I’ll* come find you.”

“...Or I could just simply join you.” She replies instead.

Kanan comes to a stop again. Turns to face her. The two of them regard each other for a long moment. silently and consideringly. All else aside, it’s been a long and *lonely* past three-plus weeks. With sex previously nowhere on the menu emotionally speaking for either of them.

And yes, Kanan knows, historically speaking unresolved horniness only makes it worse when the two of them are actively fighting.

Hera finally snorts softly, and then walks forward, stepping into the curve of his body with a slow rocking motion of her hips – and then she pokes him with a sharp finger into his chest even as she goes up on her tiptoes. “For the record I’m still yelling at you when we’re finished with this, Kanan Jarrus.”

Kanan lowers his mouth to hers with a simple. “Agreed.” He’d been absolutely truthful earlier today when he’d told Ezra that there are certain advantages to making up with Hera after a prolonged period of concentrated fighting. That doesn’t always mean though, that the two of them actually *make* it till ‘after.’

And all things considered, rKanan pretty karking sure that they’re both fine with that at the moment.


	6. Compromise Is Just Making Room (Updated/Expanded)

“You’re awfully quiet right now,” Hera observes softly, lying next to him on her stomach in their shared bed. “You doing okay there, My Love? Or am I just not the only one who’s actually been fighting off a headache today?”

Kanan shrugs, rolling from his side to his back, “I’m mostly just brain fried that’s all, Hera.” He simply acknowledges. “I don’t really have a headache as of such, though I guess that I could cop to my share of both mental and emotional exhaustion. I had a bit of a break through with Ezra after our practice today - which is always a good thing - but it still doesn’t make the process any less emotionally bruising.”

“A break through?” Hera raises a brow at that comment in question, not pushing for details but also clearly curious and open if he’s ready and able to share them. Kanan raises a hand to massage the bridge of his nose for moment before continuing, wondering if and when he’ll ever stop feeling so Force Damned weary about all of this.

“Yeah. Well, if you want to call Ezra willingly *talking* about one of his assaults for a couple minutes progress then that’s what we actually managed anyway. I’m going to choose to try and see the fact that he initiated the topic as a ‘good thing’…even he bawled like a baby afterward for a good twenty minutes."

“*He* actually brought it up? On his own?!” Hera clearly hadn’t expected to hear that particular bit of news.

Kanan sighs, stretching his arms up and over his head. “He didn’t mean to exactly, Hera but the subject just sort of managed to accidentally wrap its way around back into the rest of our conversation. We started out by talking about our fight…well that and when we’re actually leaving for Alderaan.”

“Our fight, Kanan? And we’re departing on Thursday after lunch. Didn’t I already tell you that?”

“You did. Look – Ezra’s just not used to seeing us corner up quite as aggressively as we did this round of arguing, Hera. And though he’s not saying it outright, he’s kriffing rattled by it, okay?” Kanan reaches up to scratch his left eyebrow, then pushes another one of the recently escaped trailing strands of hair back up and off his face. “This is just speculation on my part of course, but from some of the stuff he’s said during some of our previous conversations, I get the distinct impression that we’re not the first group of people he’s known who’ve ended up finding out about his personal history, Hera.” He grimaces then, “And I’m also pretty karking sure that said group’s reaction – either to the news itself, or to one another while they individually processed it, didn’t exactly go ‘well’ for anyone involved. As a result,Hera, Ezra’s now at least half convinced that all of us finding out is eventually going to cause a similar sort of group crisis.”

Sith - ‘half convinced’ is probably stating the matter just a little too lightly, at least in the older Jedi's opinion, since Kanan’s pretty sure at this point that Ezra’s just plain keeping one eye on the sky these days waiting for the pieces above to start crumbling or cracking. Which is understandable, maybe yes, given Ezra's past experiences, but still really no less frustrating to cope with, if only because it just makes it all that much harder for Kanan to provide the Kid a safe space to stand.

“So, he thinks what exactly? That one or all of us is just suddenly going to completely lose our cool without warning? And then what- toss him out like he's just an inconvenient piece of trash?” 

“More like he’s watching for the whole thing to go up like a volcano at some point, Hera. Smoke – fire, flying rocks. The whole spectacle in color.”

“Well that’s a bit over dramatic isn’t it.” His lover's voice is very wry.

“What he knows is what he knows, Hera.” Kanan replies with a small shrug. “Yeah the idea’s a little ridiculous from our viewpoints maybe, but it’s all a very real threat for Ezra. If I'm right and there was a similar event to this one in a time before he knew us, it clearly left him with some serious emotional bruising.”

Hera’s face sobers at that. “Duly noted. Well, I guess that it’s a good thing that I brought home Rex with me when I did then, wasn't it. I just figured initially that round two would probably go better if neither of us were worried at the time about having an audience.”

Kanan nods, then sighs softly. “Yeah, well to be honest, Hera I think I’m still pretty much all yelled out at the moment, after the day that I’ve already had. Though I get if you don’t feel the same urge not to kill me at the moment.”

To his surprise, Hera’s response to that particular confession is a …wry little chuckle of amusement?

It takes a moment for that to really sink in. “Wait a minute. Are you…are you actually laughing at me? At the entire situation?” Because if she is, then this entire talk just changed its chemistry. And honestly? Kanan will be kriffing relieved.

“Maybe a little bit.” She allows after a moment. “Because you’re probably right that I *should* still want to kick your ass right now, Kanan but honestly, Love… Of all the ways you could have chosen to phrase your main point during our previous argument, you went with the ‘University of Cham?’” Hera chortles again almost helplessly in reaction.

“Well how can I put it, if the shoe actually *fits* you, Captain Syndulla.”

She smacks his arm hard in retribution for that. “Points, my love, for creative - if assholish - use of colloquial expression. You certainly knocked me right off of my nice tall podium of righteous indignity. Which,” She concedes after another moment, rolling over onto her side so she can reach over to cup his cheek gently, “I’m willing to concede was *needed*, Kanan. Even if the delivery method hurt like Kriff.”

“I’m sorry, Hera.” Kanan’s apology this time around is utterly genuine as his hand rests for a moment on top of her own, before dropping to the mattress again. “I didn’t go in there intending to be cruel, I really *didn’t*, I just…”

“You hit your own limit Kanan, and then you lashed out.” Hera finishes for him, her thumb stroking over his cheek for a long moment. “Which is *also* a significant act, given how rarely you do. I mean sure, you advocate for other people’s views and needs all the time but you rarely get that emotionally impassioned when you do it. The truth of the matter is that this thing with Ezra is hitting every single one of your buttons right now, which is why…” She shakes her head a little. “Kanan, I’m starting to think that you and I need to start having once or twice a day *scheduled* caff and debriefing sessions– just to give you a healthy opportunity to *vent*.” She heaves a deep sigh, “Because Karabast, whether I like it or not you’re the one stuck doing ninty-nine percent of the heavy lifting where Ezra’s concerned right now, Kqnqn. You’re the one he’s actually closest to after all the time you’ve spent together one on one doing all the Jedi Bonding andother Banthashit.

“Jedi bonding and other banthashit?!” Kanan echoes back, slightly offended by her particular choice of wording, but Hera actually shakes her head a little in reply and then makes a purely frustrated sound. 

“Kark. No - that didn’t come across the way that I meant for it to." She sighs, “I’m just saying that whether I like it or not, Kanan - *you’re* the one stuck dealing with ninety-nine percent of the emotional excavation and repair work when it comes to helping Ezra get through this.” Hera draws in a deep breath, “Or put another way, you’re the *functional* parent, Kanan. And I? Get to sit around mostly twiddling my thumbs. Because yeah, I may know what’s broken too at this point but I can’t exactly force Ezra to let me in to help him make it better, can I? I just have to live with the current reality right now, as best as I can.”

“The reality, Hera?” His voice is quiet. Kanan's hand is enfolded around hers again, his breathing steady and quiet, as he does the best he can to just let her get this weight off her chest.

She inhales tremulously then continues, “You’re the one who got in fully through the door with Ezra, Kanan. You’re the one that heactually *wants* right now as his parent. Meanwhile, I’m still on my hands and knees outside side the door trying to figure out how to pick the proverbial lock...”

“…Hera.” Karabast. Now Kanan really does feel like sheer Banthashit. He hadn’t considered this particular situation from Hera’s perspective before now and ouch. It really does cast her actions in a distinctly different light - one that makes his chest ache for all of them, honestly. Because after all, he imagines, there’s got to be no feeling in the world that’s quite as awful as seeing a child you love hurting while all you can do is stand there helpless.

Hera’s continuing, “Or at least that’s how it usually goes – it’s certainly how it’s been going ever since we got back from Davin 7. Until I finally lost my cool the other night at dinner and tried to *kick the kriffing door in* by headlining on something that seemed both necessary and constructive.” Hera drops her hand with a low frustrated noise. "I was trying to do anything helpful at all at that point and I *failed*miserably Kanan - because I don’t have Ezra’s emotional confidance right now and I also don’t have your grasp of the big picture which allows you to understand all the issues in *context.*”

“Hera.” Kanan murmurs the words yet again – wanting to say or do anything that might make her feel better. But Hera isn’t finished, not quite yet anyway. She looks at Kanan then and she *grins* - he can hear it in her next words. “Which is why, I guess you could say that last night I finally had a *kriffing revelation*...at least about how to handle all of this for now from my end.”

Her hands reach out for one of his own, and brings it up to press against her lips gently. “I need to *stop* trying to help Ezra directly, Kanan and I need to work on creating situations where he and I can build up more personal repoire instead – and in the interim, I need to focus on helping *you* stay sane as you focus on helping Ezra *for both of us*.” 

A warm tongue traces the heartline on his palm. “Or to put it another way entirely, I guess it’s my turn to take a circuit on this particular joyride as co-pilot.” Her lips move further down to his wrist. “Mind you, I’m not generally all that good at being in that particular role, but if this is what Ezra needs and I mean it when I call him my kid than I guess it’s just my turn to try and grow a little as a person.”

Kanan groans softly, shifts his hips almost instinctively, grits his teeth as parts further south begin to stiffen up again. Force it’s been less than an *hour* since their last round. Not that his libido seems to care much at the moment. “Hera.” He grits out, “As much as I both applaud your wisdom and agree with your overall conclusion, you need to be warned, if you keep that up much longer then we’re *not* actually going to make it through the rest of this conversation.”

Teeth nip lightly where Hera’s lips have just been. “We’ve got time.” She murmurs, in what Kanan doesn’t assume for even a moment is innocence so much as its poorly wrought facsimile. “Ezra’s not going to be back until sunset or later anyway – you said so yourself. And I don’t know about you, but from my perspective it has been a really, really *long* and lonely past couple of weeks, unless,” Her words fairly twinkle with mirth as her free hand slides further down his left thigh, searching, “You’re feeling a little too ‘weary’ for round two at the moment.”

“I’ll …oh force!…I really think that I’ll manage.” He grunts, then rolls over, hungrily, on top of her again as she chuckles agreement.

Kriff talking. They can handle anything further that needs to be said after they’ve both had a nap later or something.

xxx000xxx000xxx000xxx000xxx000

“You have *that look* on your face again.” Hera observes from her spot across the table, her lips twisting up wryly.

“What look?” Kanan asks with a raise of his eyebrow of his own as he takes another bite of pastry and then a sip of his drink.

“The one that indicates that you have something that you know I’m going to hate to hear but that you know you still have to nut up and tell me anyway.” She shoots back taking a sip from her caff mug benignly.

Kanan chokes on his own drink then glares a little at her choice of wording. “That’s it.” He points a finger “You are no longer allowed to study human figurative vocabulary in your spare time, Hera, just to find more and more interesting ways to personally insult me.”

“Kanan.” Hera sighs deeply. “Look just save us both a half an hour and bite the kriffing blaster cap, all right? If I’m going to get angry, then I’m going to get angry, and there’s probably nothing that you can likely do to prevent it. I promise that if it happens I’ll at least try and be a grown-up about it.”

“So no throwing things at my head, then?” Kanan shoots back a little wryly,

“For Force sakes, that was *once – now just gird your loins, already and spill it, Jarrus. Kark or get off the pot as they say.”

Fine. If that’s the way she wants to approach this, then he’s game. Kanan leans forward a little to set his mug down on the table, then leans back in his chair and crosses his arms defensively over his chest. "Official Warning, Hera: You’re about to lose Ezra as a pilot in Phoenix Squadron.“

Hera blinks at that announcement. "I'm…I’m what?!”

“Ezra’s opting out of the fleet physical you demanded he have when we get to the clinic on Alderaan, Hera.”

She blinks yet again, genuinely flummoxed by the notion. “He’s…And you’re simply okay with him doing that, Kanan?!”

“At this point? Yes. Not only that, Hera, I actively encouraged him in his making the decision.”

“KANAN!” And there you go. There’s the irate, indignant tone for which Kanan was patiently waiting. He doesn’t let his own calm falter for even a moment. “May I *finish* please, Hera?” His continues, “Because I have considerably more to say on the subject.”

Hera sets her own mug down on the table with a clunk. “Yes. You may. Because I’m assuming right now that ‘more to say’ includes a *damn good explanation* for your views concerning all of this.”

“It does.”

“Then I’m listening. For the moment at least anyway.”

Kanan nods, drawing in a deep breath and then exhaling slowly. Deciding it’s best in this case if he begins his whole spiel with another figurative analogy. “You don’t light up other people’s world’s, by burning yourself to death, Hera. At least not if you’re healthy about it anyway.”

There’s a long pause for a moment as Hera considers this statement, then Hera sighs, “Which means what n this particular situation exactly?”

“Just that Ezra right now can and should be entitled to have some personal limits, Hera. And if he can’t defend them on his own, then I’ll be kriffing helping him do so. Including regarding any needed medical interventions.”

Hera grunts a little at that, chews her lip, and then speaks again, “Even if said limits essentially involve the total avoidance of basic and likely crucial medical analysis and treatment, Kanan? Because I’m sorry, but I have issues with that idea, Love.”

“It won’t come down to that, Hera. We’re working on compromising within an agreed upon comfort zone instead.”

“Then maybe to start you might want to explain the specifics of said comfort zone to me, Kanan? So I have at least a little idea of where the possible alligators in the grass might currently be lurking?”

Kanan leans forward and picks up his mug, taking a long warm drink before continuing. “It’s pretty simple actually…in matters of life and death Hera, Ezra bites the bullet, like he always has - and he seeks out triage care as necessary, with you or me along comfort and or distraction at his request, and in every other case, he’s entitled to every exception and treatment alternative that I can find that lets him preserve his personal dignity and privacy.”

Hera sighs and picks up her glass as well, takes a slow and equally long drink. “Could you maybe be a little less vague in the details of what that actually entails in terms of what he’s consenting to, please?”

“Oh, you want karking specifics, then?”

“I want a kriffing frame of reference to understand what is and isn’t allowed and *why* Kanan.”

Wel all right then: if she wants to go there, then they’ll *go there*. Though she’s probably going to regret it in the end. What Hera's actually asking for essentially, is detail, about things that Kanan’s trying very hard to forget about himself most of the time. Still, if this is the only way to really make her understand the situation, then he supposes they’ll have to both learn to carry some of it. “All right then - specific one, Hera: I am not forcing Ezra into a room with a complete stranger who he’s never met before and who he doesn’t trust to get stripped down and poked at. Not *again.* Especially not when he’s already painfully familiar with that experience already Hera – both as a rape survivor himself and as post-rape chop-shop-doctor’s triage patient.”

Kanan wearily rubs at the back of his neck for a moment, his face wrinkling up in distress. “From what little he’s said on the subject, Hera, Ezra had to seek out a clinic after his last assault, all right? Because the bleeding wouldn’t stop. He ended up with *stitches* okay? He was only thirteen at the time that it happened and I’m not guessing with his particular budget that he was properly medicated during or after said process.”

“Gods.” When Hera speaks she utters only the one word very softly.

“The Gods had no hand in any of this Hera, believe me. It’s a miracle, honestly speaking that he’s not straight up medically phobic under those circumstances.” Kanan draws in a deep breath. “As it stands, Ezra says that he can handle blood tests and no-touch whole body scans so long as nobody gawks at him while it’s getting done – which is reasonable. In the meantime, as I said I told him we’d work on finding him a doctor he can get to know and trust, and we’ll look into other alternative diagnostics. Anything basically that won’t require him to ‘get plastered’ first to actually make it through the examination when he’s already indicated he knows he’s got the alcoholic tolerance of a Correllian Ale Dealer.”

“I understand.” Hera’s words are very soft, “Or at least I’m beginning to anyway.”

“Believe me Hera," Kanan's voice is low and more than a little bitter, "I’ve barely even really scratched the surface of it…where his dignity is concerned, for Ezra the damage is basically constant and ongoing. Especially since…” He cuts the words off abruptly, then trying to reign in his emotions, the bitter mixture of anger, nausea and grief roiling deep in his stomach.

“Kanan?” Hera’s voice is cautious. That’s when Kanan realizes that the mug now on the table in front of Hera is actively trembling. Right along everything else that’s not currently bolted down in the Ghost's small galley, and that the shaking matches that in his clenched fist almost perfectly.

He inhales, then exhales, inhales again, reaches out for his center, and hears the room wide vibrations grow still again. “I’m okay now, Hera…I’m sorry about that.”

“Kanan…” Hera’s voice cracks then a little, “You don’t have to tell me any more right now, I get it, I do, unless there’s something that you need to share for your own sake, that’s different, but as I said where Ezra’s welfare is concerned I’m already done fighting you.”

He sighs deeply, “There probably is one more detail you should right now, Hera, not because I want to talk about it, really, but because for both Ezra and I’s sake I pretty much need to.”

Not because Kanan wants to be cruel, but because Hera needs to understand the situation in greater context. Not every detail perhaps, but the stuff that really matters. And given their earlier talk about Ezra and his apparent opinions on the worth of people that are broken, Hera needs to understand what was done not just to his body but his mind, and how it colors Ezra’s perception just about every time that he looks in the Force-damned mirror.

“Do you know why Ezra broke down earlier, Hera? It wasn’t because he’d just told me about the post-rape stitches, or about any of his rapes in specific – that’s the stuff he mainly just *glosses over.* The sheer horrors he essentially lets drip out in these awful little side comments that are almost impossible to work into the larger conversation. No, *Ezra* freaked out today because when he was thirteen years old his attacker, if I’m interpreting his traumatized babble on the subject correctly, took out a kriffing knife while Ezra was still pinned to the floor once he was finally *done with him* and proceeded to use Ezra’s skin as his own personal *drawing tablet.* The kid's covered from the navel down in superficial scars, Hera, and unsurprisingly he’s completely utterly *humiliated* by the fact.” 

“Gods.” Hera murmurs. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

“Lean forward then. I also find that it helps to take some slow, shallow breaths.”

Kanan draws in another deep breath of his own, continues speaking, albeit now more gently and quietly: "How did he put it the other day Hera: ‘Broken things are the purview of Chumps,’ or something close to that anyway? Well as far as the kid is concerned, Ezra physically can’t get away from his sense of brokenness anymore, Hera. Because that Banthashit asshole literally carved it right into his skin.”

“So no-“ Kanan wraps the entire conversation back around to its beginning, in something close to monotone, “I really didn’t have any reservations about telling him to take your little not-bluff about flight restrictions and shove it, if necessary right up ‘Central Command’s’ proverbial ass.” He throws back the very last of his coffee, “Not because I want to piss you off, Hera, but because even if it means that he is grounded from flight indefinitely, that’s still a better option right now than asking him to surrender any more of his fragile sense of dignity to provide answers to questions they have no right to ask.”

There’s quiet after that. For a long, weighted couple of moments there is nothing but silence. Then suddenly Hera is rising up to her feet and tugging him out of the booth as well. Kanan blinks in response. “Wh…Hera, what exactly are you doing?”

“Not me, Kanan. *We.*” Her voice is tight, angry, but also determined. “We are going downstairs to the cargo bay for awhile.”

“…Why?”

“Because I need to engage in mindless violence, and in my experience, that type of thing usually goes much, much better in company. Even if you don’t end up actually joining me my pursuit of ceramic destruction than you at least get to feed off of the *sound* of the process semi vicariously.”

“…Hera.” Kanan sighs but lets her tug him along. So much apparently, for the crockery, she’d mentioned.

“Two choices right now, Kanan. I can either go beat up a bag at the gym, or I can go break some pottery. And frankly the dishes are closer and I could do without the audience right now.” She pauses. “Well either that or there's option three if you prefer. I go find Zeb and Sabine, and the three of us go to Lothal for a few days to do some hunting while you stay here and keep an eye on Ezra until we get back…”

Kanan roots his feet instantly. “No. That’s is not an available option for any of us Hera - not at present.” 

She sighs, “I *know* that Kanan. And thus I’m back to trashing the dishes.” Hera yanks on his hand, sending them both into forward motion again.

Kanan sighs, but decides after a moment or so to just go along with it. They’re all, after all, entitled to their own short sharp bursts of crazy these days. Hearing Hera destroy the last of the Ghost’s serving ceramics can’t possibly be any worse than letting her chew out some stranger or try and kick his ass. If this is her version of stress relief then so be it.

The trip to the Ghost’s lower storage bay takes them less than five minutes, Hera drops him off by the shorter side of the main bulkhead wall without further comment, and heads over to the far storage lockers determinedly. Kanan sighs softly and sits down on a crate, listening as she taps in the necessary lock combinations. A moment later she’s back, grunting with the effort of dragging something heavy manually along with her as she comes. There’s a heavy sort of thunk as she drops a largish crate down by their feet, then the vague ‘schicking’ sound of a lid being released from a clasp and the crinkling of paper before something large, flat and vaguely disc-shaped is being thrust into his hands. “Here hold this.” She orders. The crinkling sound returns again as she sorts through the box’s contents. “I figured out last time Zeb, Sabine and I were down here that I prefer to work my way up from the bottom, when I do this. Start with the smaller pieces, and get louder and more cumulative as you go. It makes for a much more satisfying finale essentially.”

Kanan nods at that, scooting back to make sure he’s given her plenty of room to swing. A moment there’s the whoosh of displaced air as her throwing arm whips back and then forward again, and there’s the clear sound of pottery shattering, as whatever vessel she’d chosen hits the wall and then plummets down to the floor in a waterfall chorus of clattering bouncing little pieces. 

“Ugly Ass Cup. So what else did Ezra tell you?”

“Hera…” He’d thought that they’d reached the end of ‘sharing’ time for tonight. Hera though is of a different mindset, apparently.

Another (cup?) hits the wall. “Just tell me while I’m already down here and save us the inevitable trip later. How many times was he actually raped vs the number of times he successfully drove off his attacker?”

The dish in his hand tightens suddenly under his grip. “I don’t know for sure, Hera. He hasn’t been that specific in our discussions of his past. And I don’t push for specific details because it usually shuts him up – I just keep track of the facts he does drop and file them away for further reference essentially.”

Hera makes a small grunting sound at that – then throws again, causing yet another crash. “It’s happened at least twice for sure though, judging by his ‘after the last time’ comment. Attempted rape doesn’t generally require testing afterward. So once at thirteen for sure. And probably the first time like he told us right after his parents were taken when he was seven or eight.”

Kanan’s pretty sure, actually, that Ezra had called his assault at seven merely ‘attempted.’ Not that the specification really makes the mental image any easier for him to swallow. Kanan’d seen the picture of his Padawan at that age just like everyone else had too, and he’d been wide eyed, impish and tiny. How anyone with a Force damned *soul* could have wanted to…to *touch* him - to touch *any* such child in such a way… well Kanan will never understand it. Didn’t know anything at all concerning the subject but that even the thought of that kind of thing lites a hot flame of rage right in the center of his brain.

There’s a snapping sound echoing from his clenched hands loudly and abruptly. Kanan glances down toward his palms and realizes he’s snapped the plate he was holding for Here in half unintentionally.

Hera doesn’t even turn toward him, “Just toss the pieces over there with the others. So then he actually let you touch his scarring?”

“Yeah.” Kanan sends the first half flying, aiming as best as he can to make it land where the other pieces falls. It smashes into the wall with a satisfy, resounding sort of crash. “He bullied himself into ‘showing me’ the damn things essentially, Hera. Told me they didn’t really matter anyway, and that he needed to stop being such a kriffing baby about it all.” 

The second half of the plate joins the first again the wall at approximately twice the force of impact. His sarcastic smile shows all of his teeth. “Apparently it’s not reasonable for him to still get upset about, and I quote here, something as petty as being raped and then ‘being marked up like a piece of kriffing meat.’ He clearly just needs to be reasonable and *stop being upset by all of it.*”

“Well *that’s* banthashit.” Hera observes dryly, handing him another, smaller plate to hold, before hurling the one in her own hand outward toward the far wall aggressively.

“*Most* of what he thinks on the subject is Banthashit.” Kanan admits, sending his own offering flying, this time without bothering to wait until he’s snapped it in half. “At least most of what Ezra thinks about himself and the stuff that he’s lived through, anyway.”

“That must be incredibly frustrating.” Hera throws again, then stoops to grab more items from floor next to the crate.

“You have *no idea*.” Kanan takes one of the shallow bowls that she hands him, letting it fly. Hera whistles when it hits the wall explosively. Then she tosses one of her own only a second or two later. “You’re handling the stress involved in all of this remarkably well,” she tells him a little confidingly.

Kanan snorts in response, “No. I’m really, really not, Hera.“ He sends another bowl flying literally the second she thrusts it into his hand, “I’m just better at repressing the fury for extended periods of time until I can find a righteous target on to whom to unleash my particular level of crazy.”

Hera hands him another bowl, but not before pausing a moment or so to study him. "I thought you said that Ezra wasn’t going to share any of his assaulters' names willingly. Has something changed there….?”

And yeah, that’s *not* just idle curiosity on her part. Kanan smirks and sends the dish spinning off toward the fall wall with a shrug of his shoulders. “He doesn’t have to tell me a name, Hera, if he also tells me that the guy who marked him up also did the same thing to a bunch of his other victims and then wasn’t too smart about disposing of all of the leftover bodies.”

“Little God’s,” Hera actually aborts her next throw this time to spin and face him head-on… “He…Ezra was attacked by a *serial,* is *that* what you’re saying? Because if that’s the case then there’s probably a case file about it somewhere back in Central City with the …”

“Lothalian Police Department. I know, Hera, I know.” Kanan can also practically see the predator grin of Hera’s teeth. 

“Do you think that they ever made an ID?”

“There’s only one way to know for sure, that I can think off. See if we can get into the records. Which would be a job for…”

“Sabine.” Hera absolutely cackles, “And she’d love to have something that productive to do at the moment.”

“I know.” Kanan throws the dish in his hand again, “Though I’m warning you, Hera: knowing who’s responsible and tracking them down isn’t going to help fix the situation as far as Ezra’s concerned. He isn’t looking for justice for what happened, or even vengeance for it really – at least not as far as I’ve seen anyway. He just wants to forget and move on as much as he possibly can.”

Hera sighs, and hands him another dish. “No one ever *forgets* what he endured, Kanan. At least not really. And he should at least know that justice is an option available to him eventually.” 

Kanan nods and resumes his throwing again. “Well, he’s trying hard to move on in the meantime at least – to act like everything is ‘normal’. When he’s not being ridiculous anyway.” He finds himself letting out an amused little snort. “Do you know that lately every time I hug him, he threatens to hit me with a ‘cuddle fee?’”

Hera chokes on laughter. “A what?!”

“He keeps swearing that he’s going to make *fee chart* in exchange for his endurance of any kind of physical affection.” Kanan snorts, reaching out for another plate. “It’s essentially just his way, I think, of diffusing any lingering vulnerability he feels when he believes that he's uncovered himself too far in a conversation emotionally.” Kanan tosses his plate. “He also whines a lot about how apparently I’m a closeted Jedi sap.”

“You absolutely are, Kanan.” Hera points out in Ezra’s defense, as she tosses one of the smaller serving platters.

“Maybe so - but it doesn’t make the situation with Ezra any less ironic or tragically funny. Seriously, the kid is *ridiculous* Hera – he almost *never* asks for or reaches out seeking physical comfort no matter how badly he’s actually feeling at the time, but whenever I reach out to him, Hera, he leans back into my touch twice as hard in return.”

“It’s not really all that surprising, Kanan.” His lover acknowledges handing him the first of the salad plates, “I mean it looked to me like he and his parents were pretty comfortable in each others’ personal spaces’ in that picture that Sabine restored for his birthday, after all. I’m betting he was basically hardwired very early in his life to ground himself with physical contact, Kanan – to the point he craves touch nearly constantly. He's just also learned to be very leery of that instinct thanks to all his years on the street.”

Kanan nods at that assessment, then sends another of the small plates careening, pondering what she’s just observed and wondering what if anything he ought to do with that particular revelation.

“You ought to make him do it.” Hera muses after a moment or so’s contemplation, and Kanan’s hand aborts releasing right in the middle of his next throw. "Or encourage him to do so at least."

“...I ought to what?”

“You ought to encourage Ezra to make his cuddle fee chart, Kanan.”

Kanan blinks at that for a moment at that idea, then reaches up to scratch an eyebrow, “Uhm…Why exactly? I thought he was using it as a way to relieve his own tension through humor...”

“Oh he is...but there's more to it possibly. As I said, if he keeps bringing it up you might want to encourage the idea - even if just teasingly."

"Again - why Hera?"

Two reasons really, Kanan. First, because if he does then once the thing’s in place it’ll actually work less effectively as a means of emotional deflection for Ezra. Which you'll want to happen in the long run. Second if he actually does consent to make one for real then once the thing is finished Kanan then what you’ve acyually got in hand is Ezra's literal unspoken permission to hug him whenever the karking hell he seems to need it, just so long as he doesn't say no outright when you try and do so at the time and so long as you’re willing to pay the ‘toll’ afterward to save his dignity. I mean the thing’s as much Ezra's excuse to get hugged as it is your excuse to do the hugging, Kanan, basically.”

The dish hangs heavy in Kanan’s hand for a couple of seconds, before he lets his arm fall to his side. “I hadn’t really thought of it that way before.” He murmurs softly after a moment. “But I really should have.” It's probably not that uncomplicated of an idea but the notion at least merits more thinking he suspects. He's been so busy snorting off the repeated joke he hadn't considered the deeper ramifications.

He can hear Hera smile as she tosses a dish again. “So you’re not all seeing apparently. Nice to know, if I’m honest - because a girl likes to know from time to time that I can still earn my keep. Makes me feel vaguely useful in my own life, to speak truthfully.”

Kanan snorts. “Hera the day that you’re not ridiculously ‘useful’ to everyone you meet is the day that you’ll be dead. So… is there any other advice on anything said during the past few hours that you want to toss at me while we're on the subject? Because if I’m the ‘boss’ right now where Ezra is concerned, Hera, than this particular 'boss' plans to have large and ridiculously open ears.”

“On the ongoing medical situation with Ezra? No, not really, Kanan.” Hera's voice is distinctly wry. “I can’t say that I particularly like where you two have ended up there honestly, but I also understand how it is that it happened - and I’m the one shot myself in the foot Kanan, in terms of the fallout, at metaphorically speaking. I mean, I’m basically catch 22’d at the moment – any road that I walk now, I lose either face or I lose an important opportunity. Because after all our mutual interest flying *was* the easiest route that I could have exploited up until now as a way to try and spend more one on one time with Ezra, but now offering him additional one on one lessons would feel like I’m rubbing his face in his decision, which I’m absolutely not going to be doing under the current circumstances.”

“It may not be as much of a loss of power or face as you think it will be to back down, Hera, unless you’ve already given explicit promises to Central Command…?” Hera’s huff is clear indication that she hasn’t done any such thing, at least not deliberately. “After all, I really doubt that Sabine and Zeb are going to consider it a sign of weakness on your part if you just admit that you’ve gotten new information since that night at supper and it’s forced you to adjust your current views on the situation as a result. Responding to new intelligence is just a normal part of what every competent leader has to do over the course of their command.”

“And what about with Ezra himself, Kanan?” Hera asks him warily. “Because I’ll be honest love - I’m already stinging from how much figurative ground I’ve apparently already lost with him without even knowing it was happeninh, thanks to Hondo giving him that kriffing ID. But at the same time it’s really Ezra knowing that I know that he has it that somehow seems to be the worst in terms of how much authority in our relationship it's cost me... I'm feeling pretty deranged right now power wise honestly.

Kanan sighs, and puts down his mugs again, considers the words in his head and how to say them most gently, in a way that could be perceived as an observation instead of an attack. “Hera, can I give you a little hint about dealing with Ezra? Not as his commanding officer maybe but definitelu as his parent? Do you how I keep getting him to do so much stuff that I know he doesn’t want to do, even when I know that it’s awkward or painful for him to actually do it? I simply *ask* him to do it for my sake every bit as much as he does it for his own. And yes, sometimes we end up bartering a little as a result it’s really that important, but mostly I just tell him what I honestly think is needed and why it's needed, Hera, and then we compromise in ways that require both of us to sacrifice to get it done. And yes, I know for the record that that’s not how it’s supposed to work in a military environment, but as his parent and not just his Captain Hera you will be absolutely astounded by how much Ezra softens in the face of just a little reciprocal vulnerability. In my choosing a regular basis to deliberately hand him back a whole bunch of power in his choices that he then almost inevitably hands right back to me. 

Kanan's lips quirk up a little before continuing, I mean, he’s already exposed himself to all of us Hera, thanks to his confession two weeks ago, the better question right now really is, will *you* take the same kind of risk in return. Instead of just having all the power right now can you share it and trust that he'll follow you not because you force him to do so but simply because you're right and this you actually deserve it?”

“Kanan…” Hera’s voice is soft. Sad. “I…”

“Look, I’m not saying it’s going to be easy. Kriffl, it’s anything but that most of the time.” He feels a small smile creep up the corner of his lips, “You know, my Master had a saying I’ve never really forgotten that she used to quote back to me all the time during our political discussions: i don't reallt remember the exact wording just that the gyst of it was this. There are really only two kinds on power, Hera - what is taken from others by force and what people willingly hand over to leaders who have proven by their courage and example that they are worthy of the privilege. And Hera, uou never lose anything significant when you surrender the first kind of power in order to get the latter instead, because the second kind is the only power that’s actually *substantial.* It’s more work to acquire at beginning yes, but in the end…”

“In the end, the longer road is always worth the better view.” Hera interiors him softly again. 

Kanan blinks, “Essentially, yes, Hera.” He acknowledges with a wry shrug.

Hera chuckles. “That’s something that my mother actually used to say a lot to me back when I was little Kanan.”

Well then. “Ironic. They probably would have gotten along then.”

“Probably,” Hera exhales, sounding more than a little bit wistful. “So, shall we throw a few more dishes before we go then? Or are we both ready to sweep up the mess and head back upstairs for now?”

“I am if you are.”

“I am for now. I’m getting hungry. Besides I’m also curious to find out what if anything I can find out about Serial Rapists on Lothal via their public records.”

And that? That doesn’t surprise Kanan in the slightest. He snorts and rolls his neck. “…Bloodthirsty Madame Twi’lek.”

“You bet the Small Gods, Buddy. Rule number one on Ryloth. Only complete and utter idiots try and mess with our kids.”

“Or what happens?”

“Let’s put it this way. They don’t *live* long enough to ever make it past the idiot stage.”

“Long live the Twi’lek.” Kanan snorts in reply.

“Hear, hear. So, do you want to help with the sweep up?”

“Sure. Just let me grab the brooms from where they’re stored in the closet.”

“Great. I’ll find the dustpans and meet you on the other end of the room.”

Which is what Kanan is turning to do, until sensation suddenly bursts, hot and desperate into Kanan’s mind from down Ezra’s side of their link.

It isn’t a flood of conscious thought so much as it’s a rush emotion: Fear. Shock. Panic. Terror. Darkness. Sudden ambush. Then one more clear thought from Ezra: *ATTACK*.

And that’s honestly the only thing except flat out running that Kanan Jarrus remembers for the next several minutes.


	7. Explanations (Updated/Expanded)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN/ For the interested....Chapter 8 of TMH was originally due to be posted on December 25th, but as my eight year old has contracted pneumonia at the moment (poor kiddo!) it will likely be up between the 28th-1st depending on how fast she recovers, as my mom hat always outweighs my writing/editing one every day of the week. Happy Holidays all of you regardless, and a blessed oncoming new year!

“They what?!” Sabine Wren ’s voice through the base’s communications network is a combination of sheer incredulity and full on fury. Beside Kanan, Hera growls softly in agreement with the Mandalorian. While Rex, for his own part, just finishes methodically if unconcernedly checking over each and every one of his ribs. 

The elderly clone trooper gently prods at each of them with his fingertips before finally just shrugging to himself with a wry grin and then slapping a bacta-patch across his growing spread of bruises with an air of non concern that is just slightly short of amusing. All well Chopper just watches and beeps disbelievingly at him.

The former clone trooper has already made it perfectly clear that he isn’t angry about what had just happened. Well, that he isn't angry at Ezra anyway. And that that when Kanan ends this call to the others and heads out to track Ezra down if he can, Rex fully intends to actively join him in that searching. Hera for her own pary is going to be headed back to the Ghost with Chopper shortly. Just in case Ezra returns to the ship himself once the younger Jedi calms actually calms down. Well once Hera calms down enough to stop seeing the world through slightly red tinted lenses herself anyway. Because as Kanan already knows, Hera Syndulla is basically the textbook definition of mother-twi'lek livid at the moment.

Then again to be absolutely fair, Kanan not exactly a little ball of sunshine himself either at present. Though he’s actually far far less angry or panicked than he’d initially expected to be when he first took off out of The Ghost toward Ezra's location in the complex.

Probably he also acknowledges, because once Kanan’d finally reached the set of makeshift offices and storage bays on the other side of base where Rex and Ezra had been working on inventory together and been informed by Rex himself what had actually happened to Ezra, Kanan had shifted past mad into…well, something else. Something different. Something tamped down for now until they can properly asses and then triage the ongoing crisis.

Which is why Kanan’s shoulders just heave up and down wearily before he repeats his earlier words. “Like I just told you, Sabine, Ezra was working on inventory this afternoon with Rex in the main complex when a couple of the pilots from both Phoenix and two of the other fighter squadrons here on base - who have all been involved in an ongoing mutual prank war over the past several weeks– decided to team up in a and attempt to sneak ambush Ezra in a dim area of the hangrt, with the intent or so they claimed of both startling him and then basically coating him with silly string …”

“Dunder- headed morons,” Rex mutters from his spot next to Kansn, barely even under his breath. “Pranks are all and good for the record. My Vod and I used to pull ‘em all the time on campaign during The War, cause they’re great for building group solidarity. Not to mention for relieving lingering tension or boredom during quieter periods. Still, who in their right mind thinks it's at all a good idea to sneak up in the dark and try and 'punk’ a kriffing combat veteran?! Especially when the target in question is actually a Jedi with a karking lightsaber! They’re all kriffing lucky right now not to br missing any of their limbs!”

“Is…is Ezra all right in the meantime, Kanan?” Sabine’s voice is still more than just a little bit disbelieving. Kanan can now also hear two other distinct sets of breathing through the commlink. Kallus and Zeb having apparently moved close enough to Sabine to also hear this ongoing briefing through the Mandalorian teenager's communicator.

Beside Kanan, Rex actually snorts just a little bit bemusedly before speaking up loudly enough to be heard by all on both sides of the comm link, “Bridger’s fine Sabine Well physically at least. Though I can’t say that I’m not a bit worried right now about the state of his head. The kid was definitely not in the room mentally speaking when he took off out of the hanger half an hour ago - or even necessarily on Yavin 4 at all if you all get my drift. Though thank the kriff before it happened, he’d left both his blaster and his lightsaber locked up in my office.”

Hera speaks up then as well, “Meanwhile Sabine, the group of idiots who tried to jump Ezra in 'good fun,' are all currently down in the med center at the moment. One's got a probable concussion. Two have major bone breaks, and all of them ended up with bruises and probably a bunch of cracked or badly bruised ribs. I think that the luckiest ouy of the entire set of them just ended up knocked unconscious when he was thrown and now has a bit of a headache to deal wiyh in the aftermath.” The Twi'lek pilot sighs heavily before continuing to speak, “The whole lot of them are pretty abashed and more than ready to eat crow after everything that's happened, but their CO’s and I are still going to be having some serious conversations about this karking mess once I can manage to cool down my own temper. Because as Rex just said, guys, there’s ‘good fun’ and then there’s epic levels of stupid. And at least one of those involved in this nightmare really ought to have been smart enough to have known better than to try and pull something as brainlesd ad this.”

Kallus speaks up through the com system then, his voice desert dry as he does so. “Let me guess, Hera – did Ezra happen to hit the lot of them with a nasty Force Shove, perhaps? Because I can personally attest that he is in fact exceptionally brutal with those.” 

The former ISF agent speaks up with no small amount of personally aimed wryness and Kanan can’t help but snort softly at that bit of self-deprecating humor. Because yes, they're all well aware by this point in time that Alexsandr Kallus has both very real and practical experience with Ezra and that particular force gift. Probably more so than anyone else on the planet.

“But ....Ezra’s okay, Kanan, at least for the momeny?” Sabine asks the question yet again, clearly concerned for the welfare her best friend and probably wanting quite desperately to either see or to speak to him. 

The Mandalorian artist has - for the most part anyway - been giving Ezra as much space as the younger teenager seems to want from het. No doubt in an effort to keep from makinh Ezra’s current emotional struggles any worse then they'd already been after she’d unintentionally ripped wide painful memories. At the same time, though, even at a distance Sabine’ Wrens also become instinctively far, far more protective of Ezra recently than she usually is in the day to day. To the degree that she’s apparently even chewed out a couple of people here around the base - at least according to the rumor mill anyway, after she’d caught them making some less than savory comments about Ezra in the Chow Hall after they'd first returned from Davin 7.

“Ezra's unaccounted for actually for the momeny, Sabine . Though he at least feels both alive and uninjured at present - so far as I can sense at the moment through our link. He basically dropped his attackers like so many sacks of flour when they first tried to ambush him, instinctively over the course of less than a minute. And then he fled, guys. Presumably, I’m guessing from Rex’s description anyway, without even fully processing at the time what he was actually doing. He nust vacated the premises at full on Force Run according to every witness I've managed to talk to since we first got here after it happened."

Kanan clears his throat then and pauses a moment before once again continuing I’m…Well, Rex and I actually, are both headed out just as soon as we're done talkinh in order to try and track him down. Because it sounds at the moment like Ezra literally headed straight out of the complex and then into the surrounding jungle when he fled the main building- probably instinctively seeking the cover of the trees as he ran.“

“Wait – so you're saying that the kid's actually out in the middle of bush right now, Kanan? Without even his lightsaber along for protection?” Now it’s Zeb’s turn to speak up again, the Lasat sounding more than a little unhappy. Not that Kanan can blame him. The news is hardly reassuring. “Does he have any other kinda weapons with him in the meantime, Kanan? Especially if he’s not exactly in the clearest frame of mind right now? Because frankly speakinh there’s plenty of creatures out there right now that’d be more than happy to make a meal of the kid if they can just manage to catch him off guard.”

Yes, Kanan’s aware of that fact, and more than a little bit concerned by the matter if he's honest about it. Though he’s also trying to remind himself that Ezra, once the younger Jedi is calm and no just acting instinctively under active threat, is actually very, VERY good at things like basic creature connection. 

It's very very rare for Ezrs to meet a creature that he can't woo upon encountering it as a matter of fact. And right now considering the alternative – which is Ezra still caught up in a possible fugue state and therefore just reacting blindly to the world around him– Kanan’ll take the teenager making a multitude of bizarre or unusual new ‘friends' over him accidentally becoming lunch or supper to any of them.

"Kanan, do we happen to know where exactly Ezra fled to? On which side of the campus he retreated I mean…? Or how far exactly he theoretically could have run by now?" Kallus’ soft accented voice interrupts Kanan's anxious thoughts yet again.

The older Jedi winces outright in response to that particular mental calculation. Because by Kanan's estimation at least, Ezra running at top force assisted speed, going in a straight out line out from the temple that hed run from could theoretically be anywhere within the area of a circle of almost forty square kilometers. Although thanks to the direction that the teenager been spotted running when he first exited the building Kanan’s pretty sure at this point in time that they’ll actually only be searching for Ezra in an area about a third the size at best of that.

"Exactly where he weny? No, we don't have any idea, Alexandr. Though we can at least narrow the search area down a little bit based on the direction he took off in, just based on the assumption that Ezra didn’t actually run that fast for all that long. That kind of Force gift usually requires a huge amount of energy to employ after all and the physical strain of maintaining that pace indefinitely would have caught up with Ezra fast once he passed out of his initial burst of defensive adrenaline."

Kanan sighs reaching up to remove his mask and rub for a moment at an eyebrow, "Right now though, the larger concern is that Ezra’s either too far out in the woods or still too distracted and upset for me to do anything more then get a general sense that he's uninjured and safe for the time being. And Hera says that he's also not answering his comm when she or Rex or I call it either. Which really could mean one of three possible things is currently happening…”

Kanan turns slightly toward Hera, in order to make sure she’s following along with all of this herself. The Twi'lek shifts on her feet. “Right now, one...Ezra's either just too embarrassed after everything that’s just happened to answer me or his comm, two, he's essentially *still* in a temporary reactive fugue and not aware i'm reaching out at all - which seems a bit unlikely after this much time unless the memory his attackers triggered was particularly bad one or three, somewhere in the process of bolting from the complex Ezra simply lost his communicator, and either hasn't noticed is is lost and now trying to track his route back, which is why he’s made no effort to answer his comm when the rest of us call it.” 

Kanan draws in another deep breath before finally continuing, “I'm personally betting it's either the first or the third option right myself, since yeah even though Ezra initially went through Rex like he was a wall and not a person he also ..."

"More like he like he was a ball himself, Kanan, and I was just a kriffing misplaced bowling pin.” Rex interrupts Kanan's string if words with a soft snort of wry if still concerned amusement, “And yes for the record, you're definitely right Kallus, about Ezra's force shoves being impressive but i still hold to my claim that the kid really wasn't even seeing me. Well, not until I tried like an idiot to get in his way and stop him from leaving like an idiot instead of just following along behind him - at which point I just got sucked into whatever he was playing out in his head at the time and then got treated to the same instinctive, defensive reaction. "

Hera sighs softly at that, but makes a huff of what is most likely agreement. Kanan purses his lips a moment or so and then he sighs as well nodding as well, supposing that he should be glad that Rex isn’t apparently mad at the way that Ezra had essentially him into a wall in his rush to get past as if Rex were a kriffing cargo container or something.

"The way I figure it guys," Kanan- once he's sure Rex is done addung his two cents in -continues what he'd been saying earlirt, "If Ezra does have his communicator with him right now but is just too embarrassed to answer our messages than I really think that we’d at least be getting his message read receipts. We haven’t been though. Which means most likely that his comm is not currently physically on him. Because he has to know the rest of us ate also worried. ”

Hera nods again in agreement with that assessment as well, then purses her lips unhappily, muttering something softly under her breath about Ezra at this point in his life clearly needing some kind of karking tracking chip.

“Regardless, Rex and I are headed out into the woods right now to try and find him if we can. Hera's going back to the Ghost with Chopper in the meantime so someone is there if Ezra happens to wander thete before we can track him down ourselves. I called you guys because I was wondering if one or more of you could do the same sort of thing in the Phoenix dormitory until we can actually hopefully find him. You don't have to of course if you're commited to other stuff this afternoon, but if you're not then it'd be a huge help to have someone thete just in case..."

"That's not a problem, Kanan." Zeb reassures them gruffly. “All three of us basically have the rest of the afternoon off as it stands. We were going to try and watch the meteor shower tonight but right now we're just doing some shopping. This takes priority, especially under the circumstances."

Then Kallus interjects for a third time, “Though Kanan, are you absolutely certain that you wouldn't prefer to just have us come on out and help with you and Rex as well to help with the search patterns? If the woods are where Ezra most likely still is at present it'll probably make it easier and quicker that way to find him."

Kanan pauses another moment or so then, seriously considering the question. Yes, finding Ezra sooner rather than later at this point would definitely be better. Especially since the kid doesn’t currently have his lightsaber on him. But at the same time, Kanan is well aware that anyone who actually does find Ezra is almost inevitably going to have to, well, talk to him. 

And frankly, thus far the only person that Ezra’s opened up to at all since they got back to Yavin 4 is Kanan himself. *Will* the kid even voluntarily talk to anyone else if they happen to find him first or will Ezra only lock down emotionally and padlock his mouth if someone attempts to push him into speaking? Making it quite possibly ten times harder for Kanan to get his Padawan eventually flowing again when the Older Jedi finally gets his hands on him.

Kanan doesn’t honestly know, and he hates the feeling of not knowing. It’s absolutely miserable to acknowledge on most day how completely over his head he feels about all of this. He's far from a trained psychologist or psychotherapist after all. Though thank Force for small favors he does have a basic grounding in the principles of psychology, thanks to his earlier elective classes and readings on the subject at Temple, Depa's Holocron the Rebellions small but mostly up to date thanks to the Organas medical library. 

That doesn't mean though, that Kanan doesn't wish to Kark right now, that Yavin 4 had an actual psychotherapist on its staff whom he could basically stalk regularly for more information. Because while no, Ezra probably wouldn’t willingly talk to said therapist himdelf for all the bribes in the world at this stage in his recovery that doesn’t mean that Kanan himself wouldn’t personally pound down said therapist’s door at least twice a day just to get an expert’s actual perspectives and ongoing advice on how to handle some of the things he’s been recently hearing.and seeing 

Granted said therapist might very well refuse to help Kanan outright. Might in fact claim that Ezra can only possibly be helped by ongoing professional intervention involving involuntary therapy sessions and probably prescription antidepressants or some such thing. (Kanan meanwhile has no doubt at all that he'd be making almost immediate good on his threat to chase a fleeing Ezra across the length of the galaxy if they actually tried to force him into that kind of situation full stop, and he'd meant it earlier when he'd told Ezra that they weren't going to be trying to force him into running.) 

Surely there are some mental health professionals out there however, who would understand the need for ‘frontier medical treatment’ so to speak under these circumstances, who would also be willing to help Kanan and Ezra find some kind of a mutually acceptable compromise . A treatment option they can both actually accept so long as Ezra isn't actively self harming or proving an unprovoked threat to thr other people around him.

Or Force, maybe for that matter if Kanan asks around there might actually purchasable, loadable psychological med droid programs or other holovid resources on sexual assault recovery that might be useful in this particular situation. He'll have to ask some careful questions about that possibility when all of them are on Alderaan. 

Well that or maybe Kanan just needs to get Hera to suggest in the next command staff meeting that they should really try and recruit some actual psych personal into the resistance as well as the more regular GPs and Surgeons already present. Force, Kanan acknowledges just a little bit wryly, you’d actually think that mental health professions would be more inclined to hate the Empire and more inclined to defect just given their job’s daily dependence on regular mindfulness and personal reflection. 

Not to even mention he thinks more than a little bit ironically that Ezra and Kanan certainly can’t be the only ones in the resistance right now who would serbenefit from having such valuable a resource on hand.

After all, it’s not like all of them here on Yavin 4 don’t have their own histories, their own struggles, their own varied sets personal demons. Just look who they are and look how they got here.

Joining the resistance after all, hasn’t been a sheerly philosophical or ethics based decision for most people here on planet. Anything but that truthfully based on some of Kanan's previous conversations with other Yavin 4 residents. One way or another most of the people here on this base have joined the Rebellion because they’ve been forced into a decision for better or worse in a lot of cases. They’ve either given up or they'd lost precious, irreplaceable things. They’ve had to wrestle with various ghosts, or they’ve come face to face with one reality or another at some point in their own lives that was so frankly horrifying that it had required them to make a do or die decision.

And yeah, Kanan is guessing that most of them have also found one or more close friends here on Yavin 4 to help them cope with the things that they've experience along the way there are also a fair number of recluses, of chronic gamblers, of people who drink a little more than they probably should, or who work way more than is probably healthy for either them or their units in order to avoid having time for thinking about some things.

How much of the rebellion as a whole right now, Kanan wonders a little idly, is actually clinging to good mental health at the moment by the very very ends of their finger Force Damned tips? 

Probably too much of it, Kanan thinks wryly. It's basically the public dirty little secret around here. This entire base is full of people who are all well, basically 'chumps purview' as Ezra would probably put it, in the sense that they're all of them damaged, and learning day by day and sometimes inch by inch how to get past it, whether the scars that they carry from their experiences are clearly visible on the outside of their skin or not.

Which really come to think about it, is something that Kanan needs to point out to Ezra as well one of these days, if he can find the right moment or way to phrase it. Because it'd probably help his Padawan a lot, to realize that he's actually not as alone as he thinks in his state of imperfection. The kid's actually in very common, very good company at the moment if Ezra truly sees himself as worthless because of his personal damage. And yes, it's easy for Ezra to discount his own value right now maybe, in light of his personal history but can he do so as effortlessly as he has up until now once he starts to grasp that the 'chumps purview' as he charmingly calls it is actually populated by all of them?

Not that any of these thoughts actually help Kanan find Ezra at all in the here and now moment, the older Jedi admits with a wry little shake of his head in order to bring his mind back to the present. Kanan's thoughts have once again taken to wandering, something the older he acknowledges wryly in the moment is probably one of his own less then healthy habits of emotional deflection. Kanan knows that he tends to get overly philosophical like this in tense moments in order to put some space between himself and his less positive emotions. Especially at times like this when he's feeling particularly helpless.

"I...I honestly don't know, guys," Kanan finally confesses after another moment of thought, figuring that, if as they say the truth is supposed to set you free, then there's really no harm right now in him actually going with it. "Finding Ezra quickly after everything that's happened would definitely be better just from a safety perspective - for all of us really. Still, at the same time, after what's just happened Ezra's probably feeling pretty raw and defensive right now emotionally speaking. And I'm not sure how he'll respond to having to talk to anyone other than me if he's found by a different searching team."

Zeb lets out a little grunt at that confession, "Well, there's no saying that we have to push the Kid to talk about anything he doesn’t bring up on his own if we do find him, Kanan." The older Jedi can also hear Sabine and Kallus give little grunts of agreement to that statement, "Though of course Ezra may surprise us and actually decide he wants to talk all on his own, depending on his particular mindset." 

There's a pause for a moment or so then as Zeb considers the possibility further, "You're kind of the expert right now, Kanan, on dealing with Ezra at the moment. Have you got any advice that you want to share with the rest of us just in case he does decide to get chatty in that kind of situation?"

Kanan shrugs a bit, automatically even knowing the others can't really see it "Don't argue with Ezra about what he says or tell him that he's wrong about anything that he's currently feeling. At least not unless you're trying to shut him up anyway. Try and stay low key when reacting to whatever he does say. Stick to calmly pointing out 'alternative perspectives' in response to the more troubling things that might come out of his mouth when he's babbling. Which for the record can be really hard, guys - so be warned in advance. Don’t push him for too many details. Let him do so without a fight if Ezra abruptly decides to change the subject or just cuts off one line of discussion entirely. Because that's usually a pretty good indication that he has hit or is just about to hit his current emotional limit break."

Kanan's lips quirk up a little involuntarily then, before he continues with one final piece of advice. “Also guys, please don’t be surprised if he starts griping at any attempt you make to offer him verbal or physical reassurance in response to anything that he actually says. Ezra’s been letting me hug him after we talk ever since we first got back from Davin 7 – but only at the cost of him making a lot of exaggerated gagging sounds and protesting noises afterward in payment. When he starts feeling emotionally he's more likely to crack jokes than get mad.”

Sabine snorts with soft laughter while Zeb and Rex do the same. Hera huffs in soft bemusement and then bumps Kanan's arm softly with her own affectionately. Kallus for his own part, speaks up with a tone that's deliberately light. “So what you’re actually insinuating right now is that Ezra’s acting like a stereotypical male middle or upper class adolescent?”

“That really depends on where you’re getting your ‘typical’ measuring stick from, Alexandr. It varies a lot from race to race. Kark even from planet to planet in my own.” Kanan replies just a little bit dryly. "It is as they say a very, very large galaxy."

“Maybe so, but from the time that I spent posted on Lothal in particular, Kanan, I never got the impression that they’re particularly big on public displays of affection. Well, for anyone outside of the mentally disabled or very, very young children. There may even be, in fact, some old clean/unclean caste roles unconsciously pushing the culture away from it. Mind you, I never got to do a truly in depth study of the cultural traditions involved the way I have at some of my other postings, but I do know that the human population on Lothol tends to be very, very clannish in their day to lives and interactions. They're not necessarily violent about their traditions perhaps, but there's very clearly the constant issue of 'us' vs 'them' in the back of nearly everyone's heads. And there’s almost never outside of clan marriage or even adoptions, barring the existence of preexisting life, blood or other sorts of honor debts."

The former imperial whistles through his teeth softly then, "There’s actually a very serious stigma against wandering outside of pre-approved family alliances among Lothal's human clan groups as far as I can tell in fact. Things can get seriously nasty for people when they do buck the norm. Disobeying couples and their resultany children can get cut off from both their families and their entire clan groups completely as a resuly. Which would probably have been a serious issue for Lothalian Society overall particularly after long periods of war and oyher sorts of natural disasters, were it not for the fact that Lothal also has a parallel and frankly confounding level of general openness to cross species communities, adoption and romantic or familial pairings.”

Both Kanan and Hera blink for several seconds. “Excuse me, Alexander?” Hera speaks up after what Kanan assumes are several repeated hard blinks. “Are you actually implying that Lothalian culture not only accepts but actually *idealizes* non-traditional cross species relationships?”

“Yes I am, Hera –to a certain degree anyway.” Kallus replies with a softly amused snort. “It's not commonly known by most outsiders, Hera, but the Lotholian planetary constitution explicitly forbids making illegal any kind of cross species relationships, marriages or cross-species adoptions. There are actually numerous government backed funds set up to help support the later in particular for the interested." Kallus clears his voice briefly, before continuing, "Which no doubt explains, or si I'm guessing, why Ezra himself, who had no real clan of his own - his parents were both orphans apparently - had no human kin left who were willing to take him in after both of his parents arrested. Not to mention why he was able to adjust so quickly and painless to the overall cultural salad bowl of your own particular ‘happy little family.’"

"Uhm....Could we maybe talk about all of this more a little later, Kallus?" Rex finally cuts the other man off after a second or so longer, sounding distinctly bemused. "I mean don’t get me wrong - I haven't seen as much of Lothal as I'd really like to myself. Especially after talking to Ezra about it recently. And yes - this little talk of yours is kind of interesting. But maybe under the circumstances instead of yammering on about all of this , we should go out there and actually try to find the kid?"

"Err…Agreed." Kanan can actually all but hear the other man blushing. "I am sorry. I didn’t mean to distract from the actual crisis at hand... I just, well, I find the particular subject more than a little bit fascinating. Probably because from what little I've actually been able to dig up on the subject while talking to various historians it all may very well have ties back to some kind of mysterious, ancient, multi-species monastic order that was quite prevalent in millenia past on the planet ... Lothal was apparently both founded and ruled at some point in its past by some rather nontraditional families."

Kanan barely avoids choking on his own saliva at that particular comment.

“But then again, that’s really neither here nor there as you just said Rex.” Kallus concedes, “So back to business. Kanan, did you want us joining you in the hunt out in the woods then or not? You never explicitly clarified your wishes on that particular subject.”

Kanan turns his head toward Hera in ordet to allow her a chance to weigh in. She just shrugs a little, then he tilts his own head consideringly, before just going with his gut. “Well it certainly can’t hurt to have all of us out there. Other than Chopper and Hera here, I mean.

Chopper can go wait at the dorms instead of you three if that's what we're going to do...just in case Ezra goes back there." Hera intones then, "He hates trying to move around in the depths of the old growth forest with his wheels in the shape they are right now anyway. And one of us really does need to stay on the Ghost just in case Ezra heads back there before we can find him. "

Kanan nods, "Those are really the two most likely places that he'll retreat to once he's calm to defensively 'dig in.' Well unless any of you can think of anywhere else he’s more likely to go at the moment that I've forgotten?”

Sabine answers Kanan's question a second or two later, "Uhm...He's outgrown the vents, Kanan, as least according to Ezra anyway, but that doesn’t mean that he still doesn’t enjoy climbing for its own sake and he likes hidden from sight refuge spaces. This may sound a little strange guys but...well...while you're out there keep your eye on the trees?

Zeb snorts at that advice. So does Rex, but the comment just earns an extremely wry chuckle from Kanan himself. "Considering that that's exactly where I found Ezra before I dragged him home for supper the other night? That is actually a very, very good suggestion, Sabine."

"So that's why the two of you ended up with leaves in your hair when you came back then!" Zeb chortles down the comm-link at this new bit of information. "I’ve always said that the kid is more than half monkey, honestly speaking."

Now it's Kallus' turn to laugh aloud, and then speak mostly under his breath very softly, "Says the being whose race descended most likely from some sort of Lemur species..."

"Hey!!!" Zeb all but roars back in clear indignation.

Kanan rolls his eyes. "If this conversation is done, people, then perhaps we can actually get around to searching?"

"Agreed, guys." Sabine's voice has now shifted from concerned for Ezra to *clearly* long suffering in the face of her current companions. "Also for the record, thanks so much Kanan, for leaving me with Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dumber here just automatically when we divided up the available search teams!"

"Hey!" 

"I beg your pardon!"

Kallus and Zen protest simultaneously . Sabine just ignores them both completely. “So where exactly do you want us to start our portion of the search, Kanan? How are we dividing the territory?”

Kanan thinks for a moment or so about that, before shrugging “Why don’t you three start by meeting us outside the east side entrance of the largest of the Temple Structures, Sabine. Since that’s where Ezra first fled from initially. Once we're all there we can take a better look at the area and then discuss how best to divide the necessary search grid. Agreed?”

"No problem...we can be there in probably about five or ten minutes."

“Agreed…though,” Kanan turns back to Rex and Hera, "Before I officially end this call guys, is there anything else that either of you want to say before we all head out and get down to business?”

“Actually yes,” Hera speaks up, “While I certainly don’t disagree with you Kanan, that more teams searching for Ezra right now is the better option, I actually suggest that Sabine should leave Zeb and Kallus to form up team two and come back to the Ghost along with me instead. Right now I have a potential little 'side project' for her right now that I suspect she’ll find not only useful but highly *highly* cathartic…”

“...and this project involves?” Sabine finally asks more than a little curious, a moment or two later in the weighed silence.

“Eventual justice hopefully.” Hera replies, “And if not that…well at least, the possibility of extracting a few extremely deserving retributionary pounds of Lotholian flesh by the end of things. Because Kanan just found out something during one of he and Ezra’s more recent ongoing talks guys, which definitely deserves some serious if necessarily *subtle* additional investigation...”


End file.
